How to Use Competitor Analysis to Strengthen Your Instagram Strategy
Ever feel like your competitors are always one step ahead on Instagram? Whether it’s their engagement rates, creative content, or the buzz they’re generating, you might wonder what they’re doing differently—and, more importantly, how you can do it better. The good news? Competitor analysis can provide the answers.
By analyzing your competitors’ strategies, you can uncover valuable insights to refine your content, engage your audience, and outperform the competition. In this post, we’ll show you how to use competitor analysis to supercharge your Instagram strategy, with the help of tools like Mention and Brandwatch to get actionable insights.
Why Competitor Analysis Matters
Before we dive into the tools and strategies, let’s explore why competitor analysis is a game-changer for your Instagram strategy:
Identify Opportunities: See what’s working (or not) for your competitors and adapt those insights to your strategy.
Spot Gaps in the Market: Discover areas where your competitors are falling short and fill the void with your content.
Refine Your Strategy: Learn which types of posts, hashtags, or campaigns resonate most with your shared audience.
Stay Ahead: Monitoring your competitors keeps you in the loop with industry trends and shifts in audience behavior.
1. Start With the Basics: Who Are Your Competitors?
The first step in any competitor analysis is identifying your top competitors.
How to Identify Competitors:
Direct Competitors: Brands or creators offering similar products or services to the same audience.
Indirect Competitors: Accounts that target your audience but aren’t in the same niche (e.g., a fitness influencer competing with a wellness coach).
Trending Brands: Emerging players who are gaining traction in your space.
Pro Tip:
Make a list of 5–10 competitors to monitor consistently. Focus on accounts with similar audience sizes and engagement levels.
2. Tools for Competitor Analysis: Mention and Brandwatch
Now that you’ve identified your competitors, it’s time to dig into the data. Here’s how Mention and Brandwatch can give you the insights you need to step up your Instagram game.
Mention: Social Listening Made Simple
Mention allows you to track competitor mentions, hashtags, and brand sentiment across social media platforms, including Instagram.
Key Features:
Monitor hashtags and keywords to see what’s trending in your industry.
Track your competitors’ brand mentions and discover how their audience perceives them.
Analyze sentiment to gauge how positively or negatively followers feel about your competitors.
How to Use Mention for Instagram:
Hashtag Insights: Track the hashtags your competitors use most often and identify opportunities to join trending conversations.
Audience Sentiment: Understand how your competitors’ followers feel about their campaigns, products, or content.
Brandwatch: Advanced Analytics for Actionable Insights
Brandwatch is a comprehensive analytics platform that combines social listening with detailed performance tracking.
Key Features:
Competitor benchmarking to compare engagement, follower growth, and post performance.
Audience analysis to uncover demographics, interests, and behaviors.
Trend monitoring to identify rising topics in your industry.
How to Use Brandwatch for Instagram:
Engagement Benchmarks: See how your engagement rate compares to competitors and identify what drives their success.
Content Analysis: Analyze their top-performing posts to spot trends in format, tone, and timing.
Trend Discovery: Stay ahead by identifying emerging topics and creating content around them before your competitors.
Pro Tip:
Both Mention and Brandwatch offer free trials—try them out to see which tool aligns best with your needs and goals.
3. Analyze Competitor Content to Spot Patterns
Competitor analysis isn’t just about data—it’s about understanding why their content works. Here’s how to dive deeper:
What to Look For in Competitor Content:
Top-Performing Posts: What type of content consistently gets high engagement? (e.g., Reels, carousel posts, or Stories).
Hashtags: Which hashtags drive the most visibility for their posts?
Visual Aesthetic: What’s their visual style, and does it appeal to their audience?
Captions: Are their captions long and storytelling-focused or short and punchy?
Post Timing: When do they post, and how does it align with audience activity?
Pro Tip:
Keep a swipe file of your competitors’ best-performing posts for inspiration, but always put your unique spin on the content.
4. Benchmark Your Performance
Use your findings to compare your performance against competitors. This helps you identify areas where you’re excelling and areas that need improvement.
Key Metrics to Compare:
Follower Growth Rate: Are your competitors growing faster, and if so, why?
Engagement Rate: Which types of posts drive the most likes, comments, and shares?
Content Frequency: Are they posting more (or less) often than you?
Pro Tip:
Set realistic benchmarks based on your competitors’ data. For example, if their engagement rate is 5% and yours is 3%, aim to close that gap within the next 3–6 months.
5. Use Insights to Refine Your Strategy
Once you’ve gathered and analyzed your data, it’s time to apply what you’ve learned.
How to Put Competitor Insights Into Action:
Optimize Your Hashtag Strategy: Use high-performing hashtags from your competitors to increase visibility.
Experiment With Content Types: If your competitors are crushing it with Reels, try incorporating more video content into your feed.
Adjust Your Posting Schedule: Align your posting times with audience activity trends observed in your competitors’ strategies.
Fill Content Gaps: Spot areas where your competitors are underperforming and create content that addresses those gaps.
Pro Tip:
Combine insights from competitor analysis with your own Instagram analytics to create a strategy tailored specifically to your audience.
Final Thoughts: Beat the Competition With Data-Driven Insights
Competitor analysis isn’t about copying—it’s about learning, adapting, and finding opportunities to outshine others in your niche. Tools like Mention and Brandwatch make it easier than ever to uncover actionable insights that can elevate your Instagram strategy and help you stay ahead of the curve.
Now it’s your turn! Have you tried using competitor analysis to improve your Instagram strategy? Share your experiences or favorite tools in the comments below—we’d love to hear how you’re staying ahead of the competition!