Instagram Reels or Live Rooms? Which Strategy is Best to Grow Targeted Instagram Followers
If you have a business Instagram account, you’ve probably been asking yourself the million dollar questions:
why can’t I grow followers on Instagram right now?
Why do I lose more followers than I gain?
how can I grow targeted followers on Instagram who can become clients and customers and actually buy from me?
Is all this effort I put on Instagram ever going to pay out?
The 3 most effective ways to grow your Instagram followers today are Giveaways, Reels, Live Rooms.
Giveaways are a more wildly understood strategy and should be done with caution. So today we will focus on the other two: Live Rooms and Reels.
It’s no secret that 9 out of 10 Instagram experts recommend Reels as a go-to strategy to grow thousands of Instagram followers in a few months.
But Live Rooms have not been talked about as much yet, so I thought I’d deep dive into this newer Instagram feature and it’s benefits compared to Reels.
About Instagram Live Rooms
When Instagram launched LIVE ROOMS, the ability to have up to 4 people together on Instagram live, they made a HUGE deal about it.
So when the “big” announcement came in, everyone who had been speculating what it could be, thought it was a little anti-climatic: “okay, we can can all go live with up to 3 guests. So what?”
Lives with guests were nothing new: we have been able to do lives with one guest since 2017, when they made that feature available.
But I want you to think again, because even though most people just talk about how you can grow your Instagram account with Reels, 4-way Instagram lives are a very powerful tool to grow your audience, too.
I have always recommended adding consistent weekly lives with guests as a way to grow your account. Aside from building relationships, the big advantages of lives with guests is the exposure to both your audiences.
When you go live with someone, Instagram notified BOTH your audiences that you’re live and some of your guests’s followers will start watching the live.
And now you are able to do this with 3 other people at once.
Learn all our Pro Tips by downloading our Free Live Room guide below.
Unlike Reels, which many times will show off your lip sync skills and trend finding skills better than your actual expertise in what you do, when you’re doing a live broadcast on social media, you have the best chance to show your audience what you bring to the table. It’s the perfect opportunity to show your uniqueness in what you do and establish yourself as an expert on the product or service you provide.
No shade, I also think Reels are an amazing way to grow and I’m even putting more effort into improving my own Reels game.
So there’s a lot more into the Reels and Live Rooms analyses that I want to do today. Shall we?
Instagram Reels or Live Rooms? Which Strategy is Best to Grow Targeted Instagram Followers
I have always mixed and matched several strategies to grow an engaged audience on Instagram organically (as in without ads).
So while I don’t think you should do just one thing or another, I thought it would be interesting to look at the pros and cons to compare which one is more effective today between Reels and Live Rooms.
First up, a look at Instagram Reels pros and cons when it comes to growing your audience
Reels pros x cons
probably the fastest way to grow your audience. I have seen many people gaining 10s of thousands of followers just by doing Reels
have a better shelf life and can grow views for a few weeks after you post (some even go viral months later!)
many times attracts the wrong audience through sounds and hashtags
many times the growth comes from people who are entertained by your Reels, not who wants to buy from you
hard to get the same growth results when you’re not an expert or coach who is teaching something
very time consuming to create
require some production skills (even if it’s just shooting a well lit video)
No chance to promote more than one thing
Instagram recommends 4-7 Reels per week to see faster growth
LIVE ROOMS pros x cons
although also effective, not as fast as Reel to grow your account
easier to grow a targeted audience who is actually interested in what your small business brings to the table
builds relationships with others that can be fruitful beyond the live
minimal production effort
not as easy to consume for a long time after the live as those tend to be too long to catch the replay
brings in a lead that has a stronger emotional connection with you and your brand because they see you speak
more likely to help you gain followers who will buy from you
You’re able to get more content out, with reminders and announcements throughout your live
Instagram recommends 1-3 IGTVs per week and your weekly live room can be one of them
As you can see, they both have pros and cons. Live Rooms bring more quality, Reels bring more quantity.
Ideally you can take advantage of both. Whether we’re talking about live rooms or Instagram Reels, we highly recommend consistency.
Schedule a weekly live room, promote it ahead of time and stay on your course. You will see traction overtime, not always right after the first one.
With Reels, try to come up with a number you can do consistently, and try to batch your videos and save them on your phone to post later.
If you use Canva and need Reels and Live Room templates, we got you.
Manu Muraro is the founder of Your Social Team, an Instagram training membership and content shop to help social media managers and Instagram savvy women entrepreneurs to beat the algorithm and grow their organic engagement (yes, even in 2021). This year she also launched Your Template Club, a Canva Template subscription to provide social media managers and Instagram savvy business owners with content template designed for engagement in their inbox.
Born and raised in Brazil, Manu moved to the U.S. in 2000 right out of college to work for Cartoon Network, where she made an award winning career in creative and strategy. In 2017, Manu started Your Social Team with the mission of helping women entrepreneur and social media managers grow engagement and sales through Instagram without the overwhelm.