Instagram Bio Guide

You only have about 3 seconds and 150 characters to grab your audience’s attention in your Instagram bio.

So what exactly should be in your bio?

Before we dive in today’s show, I’ll read the review of the week. This review comes from a socially Savvy VA and she titled it “I can’t wait to hear more.”

“I absolutely love how authentic, knowledgeable and relatable Alison is. I’ve been following her on Instagram for quite some time and her e-book as well as the boss lady insider has really helped me refine my post for the better. I am so happy to get to hear more from her through her podcast.”

Socially Savvy VA thank you for that amazing review. You’ve just put the biggest smile on my face. Now if you would like your review read on a future show, head over to iTunes and leave your review today.

I hear it all the time, your Instagram bio is your business card. Yes, first impressions are very important, but I agree and disagree a little with the statement that your bio is your business card. It’s true that your bio needs to state who you are and exactly what you do just like a business card would. But think about the ultimate role or purpose of that business card. It talks only about you and your fancy title, right? Here’s where my disagreement or my argument comes in.

Your Instagram bio shouldn’t focus on you. Let me repeat that. Your Instagram bio shouldn’t focus on you. Now a lot of you are probably thinking, ‘Hello Allison! Then why do they call it a bio? Aren’t we supposed to talk about who we are?’ My answer to that is yes and no. Or maybe I should say yes, plus more. In my opinion it needs to focus on who you serve and what’s in it for them. That’s how you’re going to attract the right people to you.

Now that you know the ultimate purpose of your Instagram bio, let’s dive into some really important elements to make your bio shine.

  1. First and foremost what do people see when they visit your account or your bio? It’s your picture. We call this your profile picture. 100% this needs to be professional and it needs to be a picture of you. I feel really strongly about this. I know you might have the cutest logo in town, but here’s the deal. Instagram is all about making connections. People are going to connect with a photo of you rather than your logo. It’s so much more personal. Now if you don’t have a professional headshot, you can accomplish this with your cell phone. When you take a selfie, here are some tips. Of course look your best. We might work in our sweatpants all day and wear a mom bun. but that’s probably not a good headshot for your bio. Take the photo near a window with a lot of natural light and you should be facing the window. To make it even better ask a friend or your hubby to take the photo and have the portrait option selected on your camera phone. This gives the look of a blurry background and the subject is in focus.
  2. OK, moving on. The very first thing listed on your bio is the name section. If you want to just put your name or business name, that’s fine, but you could take it one step further. When someone clicks on the magnifying glass at the bottom of the screen, which is the Explorer tab, it brings them to the search page. People can search for whatever they want, like fitness stuff or social media help or even podcasts. When someone searches for stuff it searches the accounts, tags and places. So basically your name section is searchable. This is your chance to rank higher on Instagram. So here’s an example. If you were to go to my account, I use my name and a title. it says Allison Scholes | Podcaster. If someone searches for podcasters, my account is pushed up in the ranks because I used a searchable term. if I were you, I’d start researching searchable terms that has to do with your niche to help your account become more discoverable. I hope that made sense.
  3. So let’s talk about the meat of your bio. The part where you only get one 150 characters. I recommend you immediately state your title and what you do. Be very specific. Remember we want to attract the right people to our businesses, not just anybody. Once you’ve nailed down your title then it’s really important to have an ‘I help’ sentence. I stated earlier your bio needs to be about who you serve and what they get from you. State exactly who you serve and how you help them. My ‘I help’ sentence says, “I help moms build their brand online in just minutes a day.” It states who I serve and how I help. Honestly, I probably could get even more specific and I may need to work on that.
  4. Always, always, always have a clickable link in your bio even if you don’t have a personal Web site. This is your call to action. This is where you’re leading people. Take them to your Facebook business page or group. Take them to your Etsy shop; take them somewhere. Ladies I don’t know how many times I have gone to an account and I’ve liked their profile picture. I’ve liked their bio and their news feed was killer and I wanted to learn more about them, but there was no link. So guess what. I left the account. It wasn’t important to me anymore because there was nothing left for me to click on. Don’t leave this spot empty.
  5. Last, but not least, add personality to your bio. It doesn’t need to be dry like a business card. Show people that you’re human. Be relatable. Use emojis and maybe state of fun or quirky thing about you. Maybe your coffee obsessed or a frequent target shopper; something that will relate to your target audience.

Let’s recap. Update your profile picture. Look at your name section to see if you can add a searchable term. Include the ‘I help’ sentence to the meat of your bio. Make sure to have a clickable link and include your personality.

Until next time friends.

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