The jump to 10k
When I first started this account, had you told me that I’d one day have 10k followers following the crap I post, I’d have been skeptical.
1 year 9 months and 450 posts later, on April 9th 2023, I hit the 10k follower mark. The elusive 5 digit club that so many seem to be chasing, no matter the niche you play in.
It’s been an interesting journey to reach this point, especially considering I took a 7 month break from posting. Did you notice? I’ll elaborate.
How it began
I started this account mid Aug 2021 amidst the pandemic lockdowns. Being cooped up home with little to do, I felt shackled by boredom. What did I do? I bought a ton of camera gear and watches and started taking photos. I think I bought around 9 watches in a very short period of time, and filled a watch box (which I also bought).
I had always been a fan of watches, but was never truly bit by the bug. I wore a 216570 Explorer II for almost a decade, as my one GADA watch.
Having nothing better to do, I made the decision to take photos of watches having seen some great photography by this dude @apaullowatches. Paul was one of the first people I followed and wanted to emulate, with his dark and moody shots. I’ve always been attracted to that style of product photography.
So I started taking photos, emulating all of the great photographers in the scene (you know who they are). I slowly improved, and eventually hit the point where brands started reaching out for collabs. Took a good 3 months before I hit my first K, and did a little giveaway. I hit 2k the month after, and did another giveaway. Then I hit 3k the month after that, and did another giveaway. I thought I was a prodigy, being one of the fastest growing accounts at the time. But then…
The great Reels shift
Feb 2022 hits, and people started noticing their reach tank. Posts would ONLY appear to followers, and not new people. To make it worse, it would only appear to a SUBSET of followers. How was an account supposed to grow? What was happening?
IG had the big algo change of 2022 (we’ll all remember that one), where they were trying to emulate TikTok and encouraged people to post short form video content. Those who posted reels were rewarded with obscenely high reach not seen before in photos. Those who stuck with posting photos saw their reach and growth hit a grinding halt.
Our faves Verne and Eric were quick to adopt the change, mastering it, and propelling their accounts past 50k in 2022. They had reels that had reach numbers in the 7 digits, viral monsters. Few others seemed to be able to capitalise on it, with many even taking a break or quitting the gram. Remember Vero? Bet you forgot. Yeah that didn’t take off at all.
In hindsight, I should have had a different mindset and shifted with the tides, not go against it. We may never see another growth surge like that again.
What was the point of continuing?
It’s a tough pill to swallow - going from one of the fastest growing accounts with multi brand collabs, to an absolute grinding halt. Photos that would normally have 20k reach for me, were now in the hundreds at best. 4 digit reach was an absolute struggle.
By March my motivation was low, I felt burnt out, and everything felt pointless. From April-Oct 2022 I took a break, with a few posts here and there. To put things in perspective, in that 7 month period, I had taken as many photos as I did in my first 2 weeks of starting the account.
Some of you might even recall that the only thing I was posting at the time was EDC content, having copped my first Pete’s Pirate Life drop.
I had gone from 3k to a measly 4k by May.
It wasn’t all gloom though, as I was preparing for my wedding, so didn’t have as much time to spend anyway.
The resurgence
Prior to my honeymoon, I had bought a Tissot PRX. During my honeymoon, I bought a Cartier Tank (a matching pair with the wife). Just a calm, 2 watch acquisition for the year.
Coming back from the honeymoon, I started to feel more refreshed, and missed engaging with a lot of the watch fam. So I started posting again, noticing a bit of an improvement in the reach. I posted lightheartedly, for fun, for engagement with some close friends.
I hit the 5k mark in Nov, though slow, I was feeling quite happy with it, as a lot of the accounts I considered “big” and looked up to, were all around the 5-7k mark.
I was now one of them.
The shift of the tides
Bring on 2023. Jan hits. Mosseri publicly acknowledges that they went a little too hard with reels in 2022 (having lost a lot of ig users), and wanted to shift the focus back to photos.
I started noticing that reels were tanking. Those who were able to hit 7 digit reach were only hitting 4-5 digits.
And photos? Oh boy.
The acceleration'
I hit 6k in Jan.
I hit 7k in Feb.
I hit 9k in March.
I hit 10k in April.
In fact, we’re still in April and I’m about to hit 11k. I have multiple, consistent posts with 6 digit reach (and a strong hunch how to recreate it). My 30 day reach is almost at 1m accounts.
What on earth is happening? I’ll save that for another post. For now, photos are back baby.