Why I left Instagram

In December 2020, I came across an article by Rainylune that made me decide to quit Instagram. To be fair, I’d been thinking about it for a while, because I wasn’t getting much from the platform compared to the time I had to put in.  Seeing this penalization being confirmed by someone working at IG made it very real for me. 

The post from Rainylune describes how much you needed to post to *not be penalized* by the algorithm (a “good” post will reach a larger percentage of your followers – at the end of 2020 I reached about 14% of my 1800 followers with each post). My main takeaway from the article was that according to IG’s media expert, the ideal amount of posting would be: 

• 3 feed posts per week (reels & IGTV you choose to post to feed count here)
• 8-10 stories per week, preferably 2+ per day
• 4-7 reels per week
• 1-3 IGTV a week

The 80/20 rule (or Pareto principle)

“The Pareto principle states that for many outcomes roughly 80% of consequences come from 20% of the causes (the “vital few”).” 

Every year, I review how the past year went and what I’m going to focus on next year. Basically, I’m narrowing down on the 20% that’s going to work best for my goals. The article made me rethink if the time I was putting into Instagram was worth it or if I’d rather spend that extra time on other platforms. Being a one woman team and having to run 100+ other aspects of my business, I can’t keep up with the list above, or even rainylune’s more sensible list below that. 

I was already stretched thin with scheduling 3 posts a week, because IG also has some restrictions when it comes to formatting images to post (not to mention having to go through 3rd parties when wanting to schedule posts on PC). With engagement and growth being much higher on other platforms, I needed to choose where I spend my time. So Instagram got cut!

I’d much rather spend time actually talking to you, getting to know people who like what I do, and making more art to show to you. Instagram was forcing me to spend much more time on formatting posts than actually using the platform and connecting to other people.

How has your experience been on Instagram? Do you recognize yourself in my statements?