All of us are jealous of those influencers who are making tons of money through millions of followers on their account while we are struggling to take them every minute. It seems like they had a magic wand which we cannot have access to. Everyone wants to become the next influencer to land like a superstar collaborating with large brands that pay us to travel to the whole world and eat every diverse best looking food we can find across the planet. But it all seems like a dream when we look at our followers which don’t grow.
In this article we are going to give you every single information and tip on how much money you can make from Instagram and when you actually need to monetize your account. In today’s world when the competition is so tough, we are desperate to know how exactly we can develop an account on Instagram to make money.
So, the first thing brands consider to determine influencer’s accounts is the follower count. How many followers do they have? To what extent can they reach out? It can be said that the follower count is one of the major metrics any brand or user considers first to determine whether the account is able to be noticed and followed. Well, a few years ago, there was no set of followers that could earn you money. And neither is today. But we’ll tell you how to approach a particular set of followers and when does your account get ready to be monetized. 
How much money can you make from Instagram?
Well you will be Amazed to know that there is no particular answer to this question. Yes, there’s no limit of money you can make from Instagram. It depends on a number of factors which affect the amount of money you will get paid by Instagram including followers count, likes and followers ratio, quality of content, account niche, engagement rate (most important), etc.
One of the most popular ways to make money from Instagram is sponsored posts. You must have seen some in your way of swiping stories or scrolling. A sponsored post can earn an influencer a lot of money depending on the follower count and engagement rate of that influencer. And the most important thing is that influencers determine their own charges or rate for working with brands so that they can welcome potential income. This is also a significant reason why income potential of different influencers with the same count of followers vary.
For instance, if you’re new to the feature, you might get paid $20 to $50 for one sponsored post while the accounts who already have a great reputation and over 30 thousand followers might charge hundreds of dollars for a single sponsored post. Influencers with lakhs or millions of followers, not to mention names begin charging around $1000 dollars or even thousands of dollars. And celebrities like Virat Kohli (235m followers) and Kim Kardashian (107 million followers) can charge lakhs of dollars for a single sponsored post on Instagram.
One thing that has been made Clear is that you can earn a luxurious and comfortable living just by earning through Instagram. Instagram can become your only income source and it also may not disappoint you.
How many Instagram followers do you need to make money in 2022?
Follower count is obviously a major metric that is considered by a brand before determining who they would collaborate with but it’s not the actual factor that helps you make money. Though they want you to have a sufficient count of followers, but most importantly they want to know that their investments get good returns which is only possible when your audience is engaging.
Brands consider the engagement rate of your audience. How much does your audience engage with your content? Because this is what will lead to more sales, product awareness and brand popularity. It doesn’t matter how many followers you have, your engagement rate is a significant factor. Brands check on the quality of influencer’s content and their niche.
For instance, suppose you have a thousand followers but when it comes to interaction, only 20-30 people like or comment on your post. Brands will not consider you the right fit for their investments because they want an engaging audience who could buy their products and make their brand popular. And if someone has only 500 followers and he gets 100 likes on his one post that means he has a good engagement rate and brands would be willing to collaborate with him.
Engagement rate is Diamond
As diamond is one of the most expensive non metal everyone craves for, Engagement rate is no less than that. Follower count may vary from thousand to millions to make money on Instagram but engagement rate always stays high. It is the one constant thing that I don’t change in terms of making money. The formula is as simple as spending money, the higher the engagement rate, the more money you make.
If your followers are not engaging with your content, there is no point of having such a vast number of them. Because what brands want is that your niche followers become their customers who buy their products and help them make profit. If brands get benefitted by you, they will pay you as much as you want.
For example, imagine you have $100 and you want to invest them in order to make more money. Now you have two options, the first is an influencer with millions of followers but 1% engagement rate and another influencer has only 2 thousand followers but his engagement rate is 4%. Who would you choose to invest Knowing that the one with a lower engagement rate has followers who don’t pay attention to what that influencer says. Second one of course. Because he has a good engagement rate and that’s what a business needs.
So I hope I have made it clear that follower count is not the key to making money on Instagram but engagement rate is. Now the question is what defines your engagement rate? Again, it’s the number of likes and comments you get on each post divided by the number of posts, follower count, then multiplied by 100. So, somehow after calculating you will get the ratio of your number of likes to the number of followers. Also, there are plenty of tools online you can find to calculate the engagement rate in case you don’t want to do maths.
We might not have a set of followers or a particular number of followers that can help us make money on Instagram but we do have some statistics for engagement rate. A Instagram marketing and scheduling platform says that engagement rate between 2% and 3% is average and 4-5% is considered high. And if the engagement rate crosses 9 and becomes double digit, that post is considered viral.
So focus on increasing your engagement rate rather than the follower count by posting good quality and interactive content. Brands will get attracted to you automatically after knowing that your audience listens to you, and actually follows you.
Your niche plays a significant role
There’s an interesting fact that would draw your attention completely. Did you know that 7 out of 10 people are always relying on social media and influencers to get the right recommendations. Nobody wants to use something without any reference and that’s why when people hear their favorite influencer saying good things about a product or brand, they can relate to it and just buy it. Making the right purchase is always difficult which makes it obvious for people to always look out for recommendations.
Influencers are one of those people. You can also do the same. If you have a deep interest and knowledge in a particular niche that could be anything from Hairfall to just pimple prone skin care instead of skin care, then you can just go promote a brand and product you love or which are really useful.
Some of the most popular and profitable niches you can go to on Instagram are Travel, Health, Investments, Business, Wealth/Finance, Beauty, Mental health, psychology, Lifestyle, Fashion and fitness. Every niche has plenty of brands working for them and you can be one of those users who work with them. You can get a lot of good quality content from here and then you can achieve your dream of monetising your Instagram accounts.
One of the best examples of this is Zara. Zara is a woman with multiple talents. She is a professional composer, violinist and Audio-visual creator based in Nigeria. She has over 100k followers and now she utilizes her popularity to sell Natural hair care resources and digital information and products. She recommends these products to over 105k followers on Instagram and 171+ k subscribers on YouTube as per her best knowledge.
Note that some niches are so specific that you can make money without so many followers to land sponsored posts. For example, you can take ‘Hair Fall’ instead of complete hair care, ‘pimple prone skin care’ instead of skin care, ‘earrings’ instead of accessories. You don’t have to have a large no. of followers in this kind of specific niche to collaborate with brands. A plus point is that now more brands are looking to sponsor micro influencers to promote their products as they are seen to have better engagement rate and target audience.
Usually a micro influencer is generally defined as an Instagram user with more than 10,000 followers and less than 100,000 highly engaged followers.
Never limit yourself to Sponsored post
As we mentioned that the most popular way to make money through Instagram is sponsored posts, you shouldn’t limit yourself to it. This is not the only way to earn money on Instagram, several other options are there for you to explore.
Affiliate marketing
Affiliate marketing is one of the most successful ways to make money on Instagram with plenty of followers. But what is affiliate marketing? Affiliate marketing is when an organisation or brand pays you after someone buys their product as per your recommendation. For each purchase, they give you a share of it. It can also be called commission. Usually in affiliate marketing, users put the affiliate link or coupen code to build a network which is equivalent to net worth. There is an affiliate marketing network, you are a part of, it recognises and tracks the number of sales your recommendation led.
Making money with Affiliate marketing is as simple as recommending a product. All you need is to remember to include your tracking line or coupon code which provides your customers with a discount on the affiliate product. There are countless number of affiliate products and programs that you can join and in every niche. Some of the top affiliate programs that you can join as a beginner are Amazon Associates, Linkshare, Commission Junction and Shareasale.
Sell your own products
We talked about some popular ways but now is the turn of the best way to make money on Instagram. If you have a good count of followers and a sufficient engagement rate, you can start selling your own digital products. This is what Ron Jones does. He is a personal fitness trainer who combines personal fitness with mental health and provides some unique techniques and experience to its customers. You must have heard of merchandise. When people become inconceivably popular, they launch their own merchandise and sell them by advertising on their own accounts. Though selling your products is not the same but is similar.
Selling on Instagram is not as difficult as it may seem. It’s just as easy as writing an ebook in your niche and recommending it to your followers. Obviously, you have to overcome a lot of barriers to call yourself an actual influencer and earn money through Instagram but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t even take an initiative. You should start and keep it going and focus on your growth. Growth is always a good indicator of success and once you reach 1000 followers, just relax because you have crossed the toughest threshold.
In the end all I would suggest you is create best quality content and focus on increasing your engagement rate more than the followers count. It will soon make you able to monetize your Instagram account.
