On realising that your business won’t die if you don’t post on Instagram

Can I tell you a slightly shameful thing? I’ve been neglecting my Instagram game lately. Really neglecting it.

I’ve got my content planned, and I’ve got most of my content ready to go... yet I’ve been feeling a bit despondent with Instagram of late, and frankly as a mum to a six month old... I’m busy.

Having neglected to post for probably the best part of a fortnight, I tentatively opened up Instagram the other day, squinting nervously at my follower count, which was sure to have... oh. Gone up?

Now, why on earth that’d happen when everything out there tells you that you need to post every day, at prime time, with compelling, engaging content, I don’t know. But what I do know, is that in those fallow few days, our business didn’t keel over. Enquiries didn’t stop coming (in fact, answering them was one of the reasons I didn’t have time for the ‘gram), the world didn’t end and people didn’t forget we exist.

I’m not saying that Instagram isn’t an incredibly useful marketing tool for our business, and nor am I saying that I’m going to stop posting. Instagram has enabled us to create some really important connections; we’ve met wonderful people, we’ve won work, we’ve found another place to showcase what we do. I suppose what it highlighted to me was in spite of all the pressure to be constantly creating content, sharing stories and posting posting posting, life outside those little squares carries on. It really isn’t the be all and end all. And perhaps this lesson serves as a useful reminder that the things we tell ourselves are crucial - well, maybe they don’t matter as much as we think. Perhaps this is a prompt to step back for a moment and ask yourself which activities truly serve your business, and which are an unhelpful distraction. Because we’re all busy, aren’t we? And we have to prioritise how we spend our precious time.

This doesn’t just apply to Instagram. We get stuck into unhelpful habits with our businesses, and I think as entrepreneurs we often anxiously cling on to certain activities as a bit of a comfort blanket, telling ourselves that we absolutely must attend that event/ put flyers in that particular place/ post daily on Facebook or else business will dry up. Isn’t it a liberating thought to consider that this might just not be the case?

During the slower days of summer, I encourage you to take some time to step back and have a think about the habits you’ve got into that maybe don’t serve your business as well as you think that they do. Is there something you’re doing that isn’t really working? Could you divert your energy elsewhere? It’s amazing how liberating a fresh perspective can be!