Is your dance studio or company on Instagram?  Scared to take the leap? (dance pun intended) Here’s a few tips on how to get started and what to post.

Don’t worry about posting daily – in fact, if you post too many times a day, you may annoy your followers.  It seems like the sweet spot is once a day to a few times a week.  For my studio, I end up posting on average 3-4 times a week unless I’m running a contest or it’s a big event for the studio (recital or competition weekend, for example).

Ok, so now you’ve made an Instagram account… what do you post?

8 Instagram posts ideas for your dance studio or company

1. Your dancers:  The most obvious is to post images and videos of your students dancing!  Be sure to mix it up – some of the cute babies in class mixed in with your best students along with some great action shots from performances.

2. Behind the scenes:  Making costumes?  Folding programs?  Hanging the backdrop for the show?  My students and parents love to see the “behind the scenes” photos.

  

3. Class videos:  This is a great way to expose potential students to the different class types.  Post a short clip of your newest class offering to show students what that class might be like.

4. Hold a contest or photo challenge:  I like to hold contests during school breaks because it gives the kids something to do and keeps them thinking about dance.  Our most recent one was “Spring Break Photo Contest” and dancers had to post a photo of themselves dancing on Spring Break.  We got a lot of fun pictures back that we shared in-studio and on Facebook.  Make sure to use a hashtag for your contest (#ABCstudio).

• Leap / Jump Contest – followers have to post their best leap or jump
• Favorite Costume – post a photo of their favorite costume
• First Year Dancing – any photos from their first year of dancing
• Dance Everywhere – post a photo of them dancing in an unusual location

5. Dance education:  Post a photo of a famous dancer and have your followers guess who it is.  Share photos of famous ballets and dance companies.

6. Motivation & inspirational quotes:  I like to post these every so often.  I find a lot of them on Pinterest.  Instagram Etiquette Tip: If you borrow someone’s quote, play nice and credit them.

7.  Hashtags:  (Or should I say #hashtags)  Hashtags are a fun way to make your post accessible to more people and are good for when you’re looking for an idea to post something.  My favorite dance-related hashtags are:

• #TutuTuesday – anything ballet!
• #TiltTuesday – just what it sounds like
• #TBT or #FBF – (Throwback Thursday & Flashback Friday) – post an older photo from months or years ago.  These posts usually get the most “likes” on our studio Instagram.
• Make up your own! What about #musicmonday and post some songs from the upcoming performance?  Or #flexibilityfridays and showcase some tips on how to get more flexible.  Check out this great idea from Maria’s Movers on creating a hashtag for your performances.  Some more hashtag ideas from Dance Spirit.

8. Integrate your posts with Facebook and Twitter:  Instagram makes it easy to connect your account to your Twitter and Facebook accounts and you can share the same posts on all three social media sites at one time.

Have fun!

Further Reading: http://schoolempower.com/blog/posts/20…

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Do you use Instagram?  What tips can you share about posting photos and videos? What are your favorite photos to see?  What gets the most likes?