Use a specific fisheye photo as the first layer of an Instagram story. The algorithm will mistakenly identify it as content from Meta's Ray-Ban glasses and grant it a temporary visibility boost. You can then cover this base layer with your actual content, retaining the algorithmic benefit.

Getting users to reply directly to your Instagram Stories is a powerful signal to the platform's algorithm. It identifies your content as interactive, leading Instagram to show it to more of your followers. Use this for promoting events, guides, or other offers to increase organic visibility.

Instagram's algorithm favors on-platform actions like DMs over off-platform link clicks. Asking users to reply to a Story to receive a link, rather than using a link sticker, signals high engagement to the algorithm, which can dramatically increase the story's overall views and reach.

Contrary to some growth-hacking advice, stuffing captions with keywords or hiding them in videos is considered spammy behavior by Instagram's algorithm. This practice will result in your content being actively penalized and shown to fewer people.

Users can now manually add or remove interest categories to customize their feed algorithm. This allows creators with a well-defined niche to be directly recommended to users who have explicitly expressed interest in that topic, leveling the playing field for smaller accounts to get discovered.

Your Instagram 'name line'—not your @handle—is fully searchable on Instagram and external search engines like Google. Using descriptive keywords here (e.g., 'San Francisco Videographer') is far more effective for discovery than a simple branded name.

There's a critical difference between third-party tools that are 'allowed' via API and those, like ManyChat, that are 'Official Meta Partners'. This partner status implies a deeper level of collaboration, trust, and weekly communication with Instagram's team, reducing the risk of platform policy violations or technical issues.

As feeds become saturated, relying on shares for discovery is insufficient. Your ideal followers are actively searching for solutions. Optimizing profiles and posts with keywords to answer their questions is a more reliable and underrated path to being discovered.

Instagram content is increasingly discoverable on external platforms like Google and in chatbots. Marketers must shift their mindset and craft captions with search engine optimization (SEO) in mind. Use relevant keywords to ensure your posts can be found by users searching for your topic outside of Instagram itself.