We're taking you deeper to get into the algorithm’s lesser-known factors and tactical insights that your social media team should be leveraging to actually move the needle to maximize your brand's social reach .
What your marketing team should be doing to boost the algorithm:
If you’ve ever felt like Instagram’s algorithm is some big complicated puzzle that no one really understands, you’re not alone. But here’s the truth: it’s not a mystery—it’s just misunderstood. The algorithm isn’t some elusive code designed to confuse you—it’s a system built to show content people actually want to see.
Instagram uses multiple algorithms, classifiers, and processes to personalize content based on user interactions. The goal? To keep people on the app as long as possible by showing them content they're most likely to engage with.
And while most social media teams focus on the obvious stuff—like posting regularly and using the latest trends—they’re probably missing out on the more nuanced factors that actually tip the scales.
We’re talking about things like watch-through rates, replays, Lives, alt text, trending features, and how Instagram rewards content that keeps people locked in.
So, if your marketing team is spinning its wheels and not seeing results, we’re breaking down what your team should be doing to get your content seen by the right people with the biggest impact:
Post Consistently:
If your brand isn’t posting, it’s losing relevancy. This one seems obvious but we can’t stress it enough.
Goal: Stay top-of-mind with followers and signal consistent activity to the algorithm.
How the Algorithm Sees Consistency:
Instagram rewards accounts that post regularly, as consistent activity keeps users engaged and on the platform longer.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Implement a Consistent Posting Schedule. Our recommendation to move the needle:
5 feed posts per week.
5-7 stories per day.
3-4 Reels per week.
Maximizing the Reach of Your Most Recent Posts
Encourage Early Engagement: Instagram prioritizes posts that gain traction quickly. The algorithm closely monitors the engagement a post receives in the first few hours—likes, comments, shares, and saves all act as signals that your content is relevant and engaging. The stronger that initial response, the more Instagram will push the post across Feeds, Stories, and even Explore.
But engagement isn't just about the first few hours. Posts that continue to attract interaction can resurface later through Explore and suggested posts, extending their lifespan and reach beyond the initial push.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Share Across Multiple Channels: Cross-promote new posts across Stories, Reels, and even external platforms like email newsletters or partner accounts to maximize visibility early.
Encourage Immediate Interaction: Use clear, action-driven calls to action like “Save this for later!” or “Tag a friend who needs to see this!” to prompt quick engagement.
Leverage Internal Engagement: Have your team engage with the post immediately—liking, commenting, and sharing helps trigger positive signals to the algorithm.
Focusing on Saves—The New Power Metric
Saves > Likes.
Likes are vanity. Saves are strategy.
Instagram views saved posts as high-value content. When someone saves a post, it signals long-term relevance and triggers the algorithm to show that post (and similar content) to more people.
What Your Team Should Do:
Create Reference Content:
How-tos, educational advice, and lists get saved more than “fun” content.
Add a Clear CTA:
Literally tell your audience: “Save this for later!”
Optimize Carousels:
Carousels outperform single images, especially when packed with actionable insights.
SEO Optimizing Every Post:
Content Relevance is taken into account for the algorithm to get to the right people. Instagram analyzes the actual content of a post—using keywords, captions, alt text, hashtags, and visual content recognition (e.g., identifying objects or themes in photos).
The algorithm will show your audience content similar to what they've liked/saved/shared previously.
Ex: If your audience interacted with a lot of content about Pilates, for instance, they can expect more fitness posts in their feed.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Understand your audience’s interests and behaviors
Ex: If you're a health food brand, create content that overlaps with related topics your ideal customers already engage with—like fitness, wellness, and healthy lifestyle tips.
Actively Engage With Other Accounts Every Day:
Instagram Algorithm takes into account how active the account is and its reputation for staying consistently popular. How frequently your account posts and how engaged not only its followers are, but how engaged the account is, affects visibility. How often others have interacted with your account in the past few weeks, are considered in the algorithm reach.
Consistent activity signals reliability and value to Instagram. Remember, their whole goal is to keep people on the app as long as possible. If your account helps make that happen—by staying active, engaging with others, and encouraging interaction—your account will be rewarded with better reach.
Accounts with past interactions and time spent on the app - liking, commenting, sharing, or saving other posts are more likely to appear on other people's feed.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Be active on the account daily
Engage with for 20 mins before posting and 20 mins after.
Responding to comments quickly signals engagement, which helps posts stay higher in followers’ feeds.
CEO’s: Ask for activity log or average daily activity and account interaction
Creating Reels that hold attention.
Replays, Watch-Through Rates & Video Completion Are Everything to reels’ success.
Instagram doesn’t just care about how many people see your content—it cares about how long they stay. If your team isn’t tracking watch-through rates and replays, they’re guessing—not strategizing.
Key Metric:
Average Watch Time: How long people stick around and how often they replay the content.
Why It Matters:
When someone re-watches a Reel, it signals to Instagram: “Hey, this is engaging. Let’s show it to more people.”
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Use Pattern Interrupts:
Switch angles, visuals, or text every 3 seconds to reset attention spans.
Add Subtle Loops:
Reels that seamlessly loop trick the brain into rewatching.
Example: Start the video with the same frame it ends with.
Optimize for Replays:
Make content that leaves viewers wanting to rewatch—like fast-moving text or visually satisfying transformations.
Using Hashtags The Right Way.
No, hashtags aren't dead but beware of hashtag stuffing. Instagram still uses hashtags to understand content themes just use them sparingly and with strategy. The goal here is to increase content discoverability and reach new audiences.
How the Algorithm Sees Hashtags:
Hashtags categorize your content and make it easier for non-followers to find it via Explore Page or hashtag searches.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Use a combo of Niche + Broad Hashtags:
Broad: #SocialMediaMarketing
Niche: #DallasMarketingAgency
Mix Popular & Low-Competition Hashtags
Create Branded Hashtags:
Avoid oversaturated hashtags like #marketing
Avoid using more than 3-5 hashtags per post (Instagram only, do not use hashtags on Facebook)
Going Live
Instagram Lives Boost Your Visibility Everywhere. Most brands overlook Lives—but Instagram rewards accounts that go live regularly. Lives aren’t just about engagement—they’re a cheat code for boosting overall account visibility.
Why It Matters:
Live streams get prioritized in followers’ feeds.
Going live sends notifications to followers, pulling people back onto the app.
Accounts that use all features—Feed, Stories, Reels, AND Live—get extra algorithmic love.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Schedule Lives Weekly or Monthly:
Even a 10-minute Q&A or behind-the-scenes works. (Our favorite is to do them monthly for live event coverage or scheduling a monthly educational or conversational segment)
Collaborate:
Go live with another account to double the reach.
Pro Tip: Repurpose the Live – Save the Live recording and turn it into a YouTube video and segment out into smaller more digestible videos to be shared on reels and TikTok
Using Trending Audio:
Using trending audio is the Easiest Algorithm Boost You’re Missing. Instagram wants Reels to compete with TikTok—so it heavily favors trending audio.
When your team uses a trending audio clip, Instagram pushes that Reel to more people to capitalize on the trend’s momentum.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Monitor Trending Audio:
On the Reels page, trending audio has a tiny upward arrow. Jump on those sounds within 3-5 days of spotting them.
Pair It with Relevant Content:
Don’t force an irrelevant trend just to ride the wave. Make it align with your audience’s interests or your brand's key messaging.
Adjust Audio Levels:
Instagram penalizes videos where original audio is completely muted. Keep the track low in the background if needed.
Optimizing Captions for Conversation & Readability:
Captions written in easy-to-read, conversational language are more likely to stop the scroll, capture attention, and spark engagement. Think short paragraphs and line breaks.
By keeping captions clear, casual, and relatable—writing like you're talking to a friend- creates a sense of community and connection.
Captions that your audience can quickly understand, relate to, and connect with, the more they’re likely read, absorb, and respond.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Test Different Caption Styles:
Alternate between short, punchy captions and longer, storytelling captions to see what resonates most.
Use Natural Language:
Describe the content as if you’re telling a friend.
Lean into Authenticity:
Use authentic, relatable language that reflects your brand's personality—avoid sounding overly salesy or formal.
Utilize Trending Sayings & Phrases:
Incorporate trending phrases and word choices that align with your audience's voice (think Gen Z versus Gen X).
Using Alt Text
Alt text Isn’t Just for Accessibility—It’s an SEO Superpower. Alt text (alternative text) was designed to help visually impaired users understand images—but Instagram also uses it to understand your content’s context.
Alt text acts like keywords for the algorithm. If your Social Media team isn’t adding it, Instagram is guessing.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Add Custom Alt Text to Every Post:
Don’t rely on Instagram’s automatic descriptions.
Describe what they’re seeing:
Example: For a post about a cowboy boot event:
Bad: “Event with people.”
Good: “Western fashion event in Dallas for cowboy boot collectors”
Include Keywords Organically:
If your target audience searches for “luxury home design,” make sure you have that description in your alt text when relevant.
Posting When Your Audience Is Most Active.
Timing Still Matters. Yes, Instagram now uses more sophisticated signals than just time-of-post—but timing still impacts that crucial early engagement window.
Instagram gives posts a chance to shine immediately after they’re published. If no one engages in that window, it assumes the post is low-quality. Timing isn’t about convenience—it’s about algorithmic momentum.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Post When Your Audience Is Active:
Check Insights > Audience > Most Active Times.
Encourage Engagement Right Before and After Posting
Schedule Content Around Behavior, Not Habit:
For example, B2B content performs better in the mornings, while entertainment content does better in the early afternoons (generally)
Diversifying Content Formats:
The algorithm tracks whether your audience engages more with Reels, carousels, single-image posts, Stories, or Lives.
If your Social Media team is only posting one type of content, they’re limiting your reach.
Instagram favors accounts that use a variety of formats—Reels, carousels, Stories, Lives, and static posts. The more diverse the content, the more signals are being sent to the algorithm that your account is engaging, relevant, and worth promoting.
Reels help your brand reach new audiences, Stories build connections with existing followers, and carousels often drive saves and shares. Instagram prioritizes accounts that keep things fresh and new.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Know Your Audience:
If your ideal target audience watches more reels, then post more reels.
Show Variety:
Mixing up formats ensures your account is hitting all the algorithm's engagement triggers
Leveraging New Features
Every time Instagram releases a new feature (like Trial Reels, Notes, or Broadcast Channels), it boosts content that uses it. Instagram wants new features to succeed, so it rewards early adopters by giving their posts more reach. New features aren’t just bells and whistles—they’re growth levers.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Stay Updated:
Track Instagram’s official @creators account.
Test New Features Immediately:
Even if it’s a simple test, use every new tool within the first month of release.
Monitoring Analytics:
If your Social Media team is not tracking performance, they’re marketing blind. Analytics give a clear view of what content resonates with your audience and how the algorithm is responding to your posts. It's not about vanity metrics—it's about understanding which content types, messages, and formats keep people engaged so your brand can do more of what works.
Goal: Understand what content resonates and continuously refine strategy.
How the Algorithm Uses Analytics:
The more users engage with a type of content, the more the algorithm surfaces similar content.
What Your Marketing Team Should Do:
Check Insights Weekly:
Track reach, engagement, saves, and shares.
Identify Patterns:
What topics/visuals get the most interaction?
Test & Adjust:
Run A/B tests with different captions and visuals.
Optimize Post Timing:
Post when your audience is most active (Insights > Audience > Active Times).
The Instagram algorithm isn’t some complicated puzzle you can’t crack—it’s a system designed to reward content that engages, informs, and entertains. If your social media marketing team applies these 15 tactics consistently—from tracking watch-through rates to leveraging trending features—they'll position your brand for long-term success. The key isn’t chasing the algorithm; it’s building content that keeps your audience interested and active. When you get that right, the algorithm will take care of the rest.
Need a marketing partner who knows these strategies inside and out?
At Kannon Marketing Agency, we don’t guess—we know exactly how to create content that clicks with the algorithm and your audience. Let's chat!
Kannon Marketing is where brands come to life. We create emotionally charged content and social media strategies that spark curiosity and build authentic connections. Our creative strategy and elevated content turn social platforms into thriving communities where brands resonate on a deeper level. As a female-owned, full-service digital marketing agency, we specialize in strategy, social, creative direction, lifestyle content, and PR—serving clients in Dallas, Nashville, LA, and beyond. By aligning your strategy with consumer behavior and psychological insights, we help your brand cut through the noise, connect with the right audience, and leave a lasting impact.
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