Businesses have invested in Instagram monitoring for the last decade for a good reason. Right now, Instagram is one of the hot spots of digital marketing! As of January 2024, the platform has 2 billion monthly active users. In fact, almost half of them use it for shopping each week.
But just posting pictures and reels isn’t enough to shine there. It’s easy to lose track of what matters in your business. That’s why you have to dig deeper and understand your audience’s interactions.
But how can you gather and analyze all your mentions and hashtags? Don’t even mention drawing meaningful insights to make an effective change in strategy. Luckily, there are Instagram monitoring tools that can do all these tasks in a second.
In this guide, we’re going to break down Instagram monitoring in simple terms. In detail, we’ll talk definition, benefits, steps, and tools to help you track Instagram activity.
Whether you’re a social media pro or just starting in marketing, we’ve got you covered. So let’s start solving the puzzle!
Table of Contents
What Is Instagram Monitoring?
Instagram monitoring is the process of scanning, tracking, and analyzing Instagram activity. This can be about posts, hashtags, comments, Stories, Reels, and videos.
This includes tracking the volume and content of your Instagram mentions, but won’t stop there. It’s also about keeping an eye on your competitor’s activities and following important market topics. On average, people dedicate 29.7 minutes of their day to Instagram.
With Instagram monitoring, every time someone talks about your brand, competitors, or industry, you’ll see it immediately. You can also understand the audience’s feelings about those topics.
You can perform Instagram monitoring for many reasons, including:
- Understanding your Audience
- Managing and optimizing your content
- Optimizing Interactions with Users
- Protecting your reputation on Instagram
- Measuring your brand awareness
Social media managers often use native Instagram features to monitor and grow their businesses. The native features can limit your work though since they miss advanced features.
For example, you can’t have custom alerts, find top mentioners, or access your competitors’ data. That’s why the best way to monitor Instagram is to use social media monitoring tools.
Why You Should Consider Monitoring Instagram?
The answer lies in one key question.
Do you own a business?
Then you should start creating a strong Instagram presence.
Are you already using the platform for business growth?
Then you need Instagram insights to work toward actionable improvement.
Here are some real use cases for Instagram monitoring:
- Audience Insights: Tracking user interaction and behavioral analytics shows who your followers are and what they value.
- Reputation Management: Respond to customer feedback or questions and handle negative mentions to maintain a positive brand image.
- Crisis Detection: Improve PR crisis management by monitoring negative comments to spot potential threats before they escalate.
- Influencer Marketing: Identify the right partnerships and assess effectiveness by tracking influencer performance.
- Content Strategy: Monitoring Instagram lets you find topics and content formats that your audience engages with.
- Instagram Competitor Analysis: Monitoring competitors allows you to check Instagram insights for other accounts and discover content inspiration and marketing leads.
- Trend Identification: Track Instagram trending hashtags, conversations, and important topics to stay relevant in your industry.
What Exactly You Can Monitor on Instagram?
So, let’s have a closer look at what types of Instagram monitoring data you can focus on.
Branded Mentions
Brand mentions are simply when someone tags you in a comment, post, or reel using (@). However, people sometimes mention you without actually tagging you. As a result, you won’t receive any notification. Like this one:
Source: @dublinsfm104
When monitoring Instagram, you should track both types of these mentions.
Other than that, people may use your product or service names without using your brand name beside it. That’s why you should also monitor all your branded keywords on Instagram.
What are branded keywords exactly?
There are 4 types of branded keywords:
- Brand Names (ex: Pizza Hut)
- Product/service Names (ex: Meat Lover’s Pizza)
- Brand Long-tail Keywords (ex: Pizza Hut restaurant near me)
- Brand Name Variations (ex: Pizza Hat)
Instagram will notify you about the tagged mentions, but not the ones without a tag. If you want that, you need to use a monitoring tool. Tracking these keywords lets you measure brand awareness, understand user sentiment, and address customer feedback.
Hashtags
Knowing how to use Instagram hashtags is a digital marketing fundamental. You can keep an eye on hashtags relevant to your brand, industry, or campaigns for many reasons. These include the following:
- Staying updated on trending topics
- Tracking user-generated content
- Measuring your Hashtag Campaigns’ reach and effectiveness
Engagement
Instagram monitoring helps you increase your followers and engagement.
Tracking engagement metrics provides insights into audience interaction and campaign success. Understanding what your target audience wants leads you to refine your social media strategy.
Here’s a list of the top engagement metrics for Instagram:
- Likes
- Comments
- Shares
- Saves
- Impressions
- Reach
- Profile Visits
Follower Growth
Brands always try to get more Instagram followers. But it’s not just about tracking the number of followers from time to time. You must pay attention to follower count changes and identify patterns.
Tracking follower growth allows you to:
- Benchmark your Instagram marketing effectiveness against competitors
- Discover factors that contribute to follower gain or loss
- Adjust your strategies to test if they attract or retain followers
Instagram Public Profiles
Monitoring Instagram public profiles of competitors or industry leaders offers valuable competitive intelligence. Observe their content, engagement levels, and audience demographics. Then, you can gain insights into their strategies and content performance.
Furthermore, advanced Instagram monitoring offers influencer identification. Find the best Instagram profiles to advocate for you; Celebrities, micro-influencers, or even high-engaging users.
Instagram Monitoring Using Mentionlytics in 4 Steps
To monitor Instagram in no time, you can use an advanced tool, like Mentionlytics. It’s an AI-powered digital marketing platform that specializes in social media monitoring.
Mentionlytics offers advanced analytics and tracking automation for all social media platforms, including Instagram. So, here’s how to perform Instagram monitoring by using Mentionlytics in 4 simple steps.
Step #1: Create An Account and Add Your Keywords/Hashtags
Firstly, create your account in just a few minutes!
Then, add keywords and hashtags that are relevant to your:
- Brand: Your brand name, product/service names, ambassador names, branded hashtags, and your social channels
- Competitors: The name of their company, product, and services, related people, hashtags, and social media
- Industry: Marketing leads, niche hashtags, discussion topics, commonly used phrases and industry leader names/profiles
You don’t have to add all keywords, but it helps you see the bigger picture.
You can also search multiple hashtags at the same time thanks to the app’s Boolean search capability.
Step #2: Review Analytics and Insights
After completing your account creation, go to the app’s Overview. Make sure you filter your results by channel, choosing Instagram. Another option is to go directly to the search menu on the left. Choose Mentions and then Instagram Mentions.
You can look at the total number of mentions, social reach, and social engagement. Moreover, as one of the best sentiment analysis tools, Mentionlytics is very accurate in tracking sentiment.
You can get insights on audience demographics as well. Visit the World Map on the Overview and discover your top mentioners and their countries.
Step #3: Generate Reports and Take Action
Mentionlytics allows you to create and customize three different reports. They can include your results and automatically compare them to competitor data.
The Top Mentions report focuses on mentions number, social reach, engagement, and sentiment analysis. It also includes trending keywords and hashtags in the Word Cloud. Use this report to identify types of content and marketing efforts that work for your audience.
The Influencers Report shows you your top mentioners in every channel separately. It also uncovers their country and language. Use this report to discover the best channels and influential voices to partner with.
Finally, the Share of Voice Report is perfect for competitive benchmarking. In short, it compares you to competitors in mention volume, sentiment, weekday performance, and country mapping.
Step #4: Set Up Alerts for Real-Time Monitoring
Finally, don’t forget to set up alerts.
On reports, click Schedule and then + to add a new notification.
You can choose what Instagram tracker will the report feature. For example, branded keywords, competitor mentions, or industry leads.
Then you have to select the frequency of your e-mail alerts. Choose between daily, weekly, and monthly based on your company’s needs.
You’re now ready to start receiving insights and take action!
Best Instagram Monitoring Tools
Here are the best Instagram monitoring apps for your brand.
1. Mentionlytics
Mentionlytics is an all-in-one social media monitoring platform. It also works as a web-tracking tool for blogs, forums, and news sites. Media giants trust the platform for its data accuracy and proactive reputation management.
You’ve already seen some of the best Mentionlytics features above. These are intelligent sentiment analysis in all languages, social media reports, influencer identification, and custom alerts. But let’s take a look at other cool features you get with Mentionlytics:
- Advanced Boolean Search for Data Filtering
- Social Intelligence Advisor (SIA) for Personalized Advice
- Team Collaboration with Tags, Labels, and Task Assignments
- Social Media Scheduling & Automated Publishing
Pricing starts at $69/month.
2. Hootsuite
Hootsuite may be popular for its social media scheduling, but it also serves as a solid option for Instagram monitoring. In detail, Hootsuite allows users to track performance data on Instagram posts, Stories, and Reels.
Key features include:
- Social Media Analytics
- Best Times to Post Suggestions
- Inbox and Messaging Management
- AI Content Creation
Pricing starts at €149/month.
3. Instagram Insights
One of the best Instagram tools comes from within the app itself! Instagram Insights offers users valuable insights into their account performance.
Basic features include:
- Post and Story Performance Tracking
- Audience Demographics
- Impressions and Reach Data.
- Engagement Data
It’s not the best option for complex processes, like Instagram hashtag monitoring. However, the app works just fine for everyday tracking, like Instagram account monitoring. Also, it’s free!
4. Keyhole
Keyhole is a social media analytics tool that provides real-time Instagram monitoring for users. Customers get insights on hashtags, keywords, and campaigns across various social media platforms, including Instagram.
Keyhole offers data on Instagram trends and cool features, such as:
- Social Listening & Campaigns
- User Engagement & Profile Analytics
- Influencer Tracking
- Instagram Scheduling
Pricing starts at $89/month.
Try Monitoring Instagram for Free
So, that’s everything you need to know about Instagram monitoring. It’s a valuable practice for businesses that want to expand their growth in social media channels.
You can track engagement and reach metrics via the native Instagram app. However, if you want real-time reputation management and personalized advice, the Insights app won’t do it.
On the contrary, you should invest in an advanced Instagram monitoring tool, like Mentionlytics.
Want to check the Mentionlytics capabilities first? Then sign up for a free trial and start tracking Instagram analytics for free!
FAQs
How Do You Monitor Someone on Instagram?
You can monitor someone on Instagram by using social media monitoring tools or manually tracking their activity.
Can You Monitor Instagram Direct Messages (DMs)?
Monitoring Instagram DMs is challenging as they are private conversations. However, some advanced social media management tools offer unified inbox features. That means that they can manage and track Instagram DMs.
Can You Monitor Instagram Hashtags?
Yes, you can track Instagram hashtags to follow trends, user-generated content, and mentions related to specific topics. Moreover, with intelligent Instagram monitoring tools, like Mentionlytics, you can search for multiple hashtags at the same time!
Can You Monitor Instagram Accounts?
Yes, you can monitor Instagram accounts by manually checking for engagement metrics or by using tracking tools. Social media monitoring tools amplify Instagram account monitoring, by allowing you to track activity, follower growth, and campaign success.
