I have always preached that there was no reason for small business owners to have a separate business account from their personal account on Instagram, but recently I’ve actually CHANGED MY MIND… people are allowed to do that, right?  Change their mind? In this blog article let’s look at the question:

Should I Manage a Separate Instagram Account for My Business?

Let’s stop here for a moment and clarify something. I always recommended that if you have a business, you should  maintain a professional Instagram account (either a creator or business account). This allows you to have great analytics, connect to your Facebook business page and run ads if/when you decide to do so. See this article about how to set up your Business Instagram profile here. 

In this article, we are going to discuss if small business owners should turn their personal accounts into professional accounts. As well as if they should manage their businesses from one singular account, or manage two separate accounts: Business and Personal.

Maintaining a Single Instagram Account for Both Your Personal and Business Page

Business Accounts need a dose of personality anyway. The nature of social media is to be “social” which almost always means letting people get to know a little bit of you. Thus, if you “need” to share a bit of your personal life to create a successful business Instagram account, why not “kill two birds with one stone?”

1. Personal friends are great referral sources. When you operate a small business it is important to let those that know you best know what you are doing! Even if they don’t need your service, they might know someone who does and can always vouch for your character.  When you combine your personal and business accounts you’ll be sure that your friends and your family think of you first when someone they know needs the services you offer.
2. Saves time. Small business owners are pulled in a thousand directions. Maintaining one Instagram account instead of two saves time. Two accounts comes with twice the amount of responsibility, making it harder to dedicate the correct  amount of digital marketing needed to be successful!

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3. Feels more authentic. Our lives are a mix of our business and personal lives so a single Instagram account in which you share both types of content can feel more authentic and believable, and in 2022 authenticity is proving important to viewers.

Reasons to Consider Maintaining Two Separate Instagram Accounts

1. Starting over can mean a drop in engagement. If you have an existing and active personal Instagram account with an engaged following, chances are they all won’t be interested in your new business content, and won’t respond or engage with your new posts. Decreased engagement means decreased favor with the Instagram algorithm which means the app will show you posts to less people. So then less of your friends who might like to see your personal posts won’t see them
2. Having a Business-only account can help you establish instant boundaries. You could turn your personal accounts to a “private mode”,  and be selective with what personal information you share publicly on your business page. 
3. Content creation can be harder. If you don’t know to whom you are talking it’s hard to figure out what to say! Having a targeted purpose for your business account helps you create content that your followers want to hear. One secret of a great Instagram Business account is to identify, in detail, your ideal customer, and then speak directly to them with your Instagram content.
4. Consistently sharing content around your business helps you establish yourself as an expert. When business content is muddied by too much personal content it isn’t quite as clear to the viewer what you do and who your business serves. By keeping your accounts separate, your ideal customer can have full on eyes on YOU.

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5. Consistent content around a particular topic helps Instagram AI know whom to show your content. When you jump from business, to your workout, to your kids and then your coffee it can be confusing to the AI. By keeping business objectives clear, and personal activities in a separate space, Instagram AI can perform the best. 

Last week, at a women’s networking breakfast, our keynote speaker Dionne Dean,  encouraged us to spend time researching and understanding our ideal customer, and then simply deliver content that they want to engage with  on our social media feed to grow our business. While listening to Dionne, it hit me that the reason I struggled to post business content on my combined personal/business Instagram account was because I was never sure to whom I was speaking!

I have a very active personal friend base on my Instagram feed who loves heartfelt posts or rare photos of my teenagers, but who have no need and/or no interest in digital marketing! Dionne changed my mind instantly! I have lots of things to say about how small businesses can grow their brands with digital advertising, I just needed a different place to say it! This is why for me two accounts may be just what I need! 

If you are interested in helping a small business make a bigger impact online, then come see me on Instagram at my new account here! 

But just because that was the right choice for me now, does not mean that is the right choice for you and your business. Consider the pros and cons I laid out in this article, then choose the Instagram account set-up, combined or not combined, that is right for you!