8 Pro Tips for Covering a Festival on Instagram, From Instagram

 

  1. Give Followers an All-Access Pass

    • Festival FOMO is real. Most people who watch your content won’t actually be there, so sharing the play-by-play of your day (from getting to the festival, to what you’re up to on the grounds) makes them feel like they’re right there with you. Taking followers behind the scenes is part of the magic of Instagram!

  2. Use All the Things

    • Instagram is a massive community, with over 1 billion members around the world. We’ve seen Instagram usage spike during major events and festivals, so take advantage of all those eyes and use the entire platform to get maximum reach — Feed, Stories, Live and now IGTV for longer content.

  3. “Where Are You?”

    • Those are three words everyone at a festival gets texted a million times, and it’s also a good reminder for the ‘gram: Use a couple of specific hashtags (like #nytfoodfestival) and festival location tags to help new people find your content. Hashtags can be particularly impactful during big events, with so many people following along from afar.

  4. But First, Velfie 

    • What is a “velfie”, you ask? It’s a word we just made up to describe a video selfie. More video is being consumed on Instagram than ever, and we see that going face-first and giving a personality to your videos is incredibly effective. So, it’s OK to go hard on the Boomerangs or the slow pans.

  5. Buddy Up

    • Sticking with your friends is key to festival survival and also makes for killer IG Stories content. People love to see their friends, family and favorite Instagram personalities collaborating with each other. Leverage your network to create fun content or ask someone on the ground to share their POV.

  6. “What?! I Cant Hear You!”

    • Festivals get crazy loud. You might want to bring headphones if you need to playback a video clip before you post. And remember, about 60 percent of people on IG Stories listen with sound on, so it’s not a bad idea to add a little display copy on top of your videos for those listening with the sound off.  

  7. Channel Your Inner Artist

    • With drawing tools, stickers, GIFs and face filters, it’s easy to channel festival vibes on Stories. We typically see posts created within the app outperform overly produced content that can feel like a #ad.

  8. Do It All For the Fans 

    • Don’t just broadcast content at your followers — engage with them. Ask questions with the poll sticker. Respond to comments and in Direct. Do a Q&A on Live. We often hear that using interactive features in Stories can lead to higher engagement. Instagram’s super power is community, so tap into it.