10 things to do if you are starting your social media page from scratch

When Instagram locked Ifedayo Agoro, the creator behind Diary of a Naija Girl, out of her page for three days last month, she shared a video explaining exactly how she would rebuild if she ever had to start from nothing.

Her experience is a reminder that no page is guaranteed, and that whether you are a creator, a small business or a brand starting fresh, the first months on social media decide a lot about how far you go.

These are the habits worth building from day one.

1. Post on stories every day

Stories keep you visible to the people who already follow you, even on days when you have nothing new for your feed. Instagram Stories passed 500 million daily users as far back as 2019, according to Mark Zuckerberg on Facebook’s earnings call that year, which shows how many people check them daily.

2. Reply to comments

Responding to comments shows your audience that there is a real person behind the page, and people have come to expect it. A 2020 Sprout Social study found that 79% of consumers expect a brand to respond within 24 hours of reaching out on social media, while 40% expect a reply within the first hour.

3. Repost content that already did well

A post that worked once can work again, especially for new followers who never saw it the first time. Instagram has made this easier with trial reels, which it rolled out globally in December 2024 so creators can test videos with people who don’t follow them before sharing to their main audience.

4. Value your small audience early

Waiting until you have a big following before you engage closely with your community is a mistake, because smaller accounts often have the most engaged audiences. HypeAuditor data cited by Shopify puts the average engagement rate of nano creators, those with up to 10,000 followers, at 2.53%, compared with 0.92% for mega creators with more than a million.

5. Experiment with different kinds of content
Sticking to the one format you are comfortable with can limit how many new people find you, because much of what users see now comes from accounts they don’t follow. On Meta’s earnings call in April 2023, Zuckerberg said about 40% of the content people see on Instagram is recommended by AI from accounts they don’t follow, and that those recommendations had increased time spent on the app by more than 24% since Reels launched.

6. Talk about your business regularly

People cannot buy from a business they don’t know exists, so being clear about what you offer, who it is for and what it does should be part of your regular content. The same 2020 Sprout Social study found that about nine in ten consumers buy from brands they follow on social media.

7. Build an email list from the start
Social media platforms can lock you out or go down without warning. On 4 October 2021, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp were offline for almost six hours after what the company called a faulty configuration change, leaving businesses with no way to reach customers through those apps. An email list is an audience you own, and in Litmus’s 2025 State of Email report, 35% of marketing leaders said they get $10 to $36 back for every $1 they spend on email, with another 30% reporting $36 to $50.

8. Post more casual content
Not every post needs perfect lighting and a full setup, and audiences often respond better to content that feels real. In a June 2026 Clutch survey of 408 consumers, 47% said that a host stumbling, laughing or going off-script makes brand content feel more authentic and likable.

9. Focus on value instead of followers

A big following means very little if people don’t trust you enough to buy from you, and the surest way to earn that trust is content that helps people without asking for anything in return. Edelman’s 2019 Trust Barometer special report on brands found that 81% of consumers across eight countries said being able to trust a brand to do what is right is a deciding factor in their purchases.

10. Build a community before you sell

Every tip on this list leads back to community. The people who feel seen when you reply to them, who get value from your content and who feel closer to you through casual posts are the ones most likely to buy when you finally start talking about your business, because by then they already trust you.