To conclude my social media experiment, I am happy to say that I have reached the goals that I set at the beginning of this experiment. When I first started, my main goal was not to grow a business out of it but rather, to gain deeper insights into the business side of Instagram – which I was able to do! I was interested in seeing how businesses utilize Instagram to their advantage and also what types of posts work in reaching and engaging an audience.

Without a doubt, like every other project, not everything will go as planned. I began my online thrift store focusing more on the aesthetic aspects, thinking that it would appeal more to consumers. However, I see that this was not the case. In fact, I noticed that accounts that look less put-together are likely to have more engagement. Perhaps this is because the less professional-looking pages have a friendlier feeling. Another thing that did not go as I expected is the video content. Although I’m not sure about other businesses, I find that video content does not provide much help for online thrift stores. Indeed there are other videos that could possibly work but from the ones I have made, they do not do particularly well.

With that being said, I shall now move onto my findings and successes. Firstly, I was able to achieve my target of 100 followers with 83% of them being Australian. It was rather tough at the start since I technically have no control over the accounts that do follow me. However, I have been trying to strategically target Australian accounts by using Australian-related hashtags as well as mainly following Australian accounts. Even though I don’t have a large following yet, I am pleased that my account is heading in the right direction!

Finally, going back to my initial question, What type of social media posts do businesses need to make to effectively utilize social media to attract consumers and maintain their consumer-brand relationship? Once again, I can’t say for other businesses, I can safely say that for clothing stores – thrift store accounts in particular – less is more. Meaning that consumers prefer simpler pictures as compared to a high production photo because they give off a more welcoming feel. Along with this, brands need to consistently upload content in order to maintain their consumer-brand relationship.

More than anything, this social media experiment has taught me that it takes dedication and passion to grow a business on Instagram. Consumers nowadays are smart and they can definitely see which brands care put in more effort and which brands don’t really care. Furthermore, I am now confident in utilizing the Instagram business tools and analytics for future use. At this point, I’m not sure if I am going to continue with my online thrift store but overall, it was a great learning experience for me and I am satisfied with the insights I have gained. I am happy that I can now use Instagram for business purposes and not just for personal use.