Everyone seems to want more Instagram followers, more likes, more comments, and more attention on their profiles. Paying for followers is sketchy and unreliable. Here are seven ways to grow your account organically and increase profile views:

1. Use hashtags and hide them.

On Instagram, you can use up to 30 hashtags. Go online and decide which ones will work best for your profile or post. To hide your hashtags, go into your notes and make a row of 5 the dot symbol, pressing enter after each one. It should look like this.

•

•

•

•

•

(insert hashtags here)

Copy this from your notes with your hashtags in the proper spot, and paste it immediately after you post into the comments.

2. Follow people.

This one is obvious but generally avoided because no one wants to follow a mass amount of strangers or be following more than they are followed. Following people is a great way to get profile visits.

If you're going to use this method, go to a popular post that is similar to ones that are on your profile and look at everyone who has liked the post. Follow the accounts who have liked the post, rather than following another person’s followers. This way, you know that an account is active and more likely to like your posts if they follow back. You can also follow active accounts who have recently posted on a hashtag.

3. Follow celebrities.

Many accounts will go into the followers of a celebrity and follow tons of their followers. If you follow popular accounts like Justin Bieber, the Kardashians, Selena Gomez, and Taylor Swift, in the first few hours, you will get a spike in followers! The more celebrities you follow, the more accounts will follow you. After a few hours or days (up to you), unfollow the celebrities, wait a while, and then refollow them to get a new spike.

4. Use a tracker app.

Use an app to unfollow people who don't follow back. Some apps will even chart your profile growth, which is really helpful for Youtubers or businesses.

5. Edit your pictures.

Use filters, Instagram editing tools, or a retouching app to increase saturation, contrast, brightness, etc. to make your photos look nicer. People are attracted to accounts with quality content on their feed. You won't grow your followers in the way you want to unless you have a strong feed with visually appealing posts.

6. Archive old posts.

Archive posts that distract or take away from your feed. If you're going for a theme, or just want to declutter your profile to attract new potential followers, putting posts away for a while could be helpful! If you archive them, you can always put them right back where they were!

To archive a post, click the 3 dots that appear above a post in the right-hand corner of the white bar with your username in it, and hit “archive”. To see the posts you've archived, go to your profile and click the clock icon with a circular arrow around. It is in the very top right corner of your screen.

To put a post back, click the 3 dots on an archived post, but it will give you the option to “show on profile”.

7. Be patient.

It may take some time for your profile to build. Enjoy Instagram for its purpose: Photo Sharing, not image building. Just be as active as you can! Comment on posts, like posts, and don't let social media use bring you negativity.