11k Instagram followers but low engagement — what would you change?

I run social media and e-commerce for a small jewelry company and I’d love some outside perspective from people who work in social.

We’re a small business (2 co-owners, 4 employees) making customizable vintage-style jewelry. The aesthetic is very Victorian / antique inspired (think Bridgerton), and everything is made from sterling silver, gold filled, gold vermeil, or solid gold. A lot of the pieces use antique charms and gemstones, and everything is assembled custom for the customer while they’re shopping.

My role is Director of Communications & E-commerce, but in reality I handle pretty much everything related to digital:

  • social media strategy
  • filming and editing video
  • professional product photography
  • website building and updates
  • packaging online orders
  • creative direction

I’m also the only person managing social media. I started in July 2025 and since then we’ve grown from ~2k followers to 11k on Instagram.

Instagram stats:

  • 11k followers
  • 77k views in the last 30 days
  • ~1,500 interactions in the last 30 days
  • posts average 50–200 likes

About 99% of our content is short form video / reels. Most of them are step-by-step videos of customers choosing charms, stones, or components and then us assembling the final piece. We post around 7-15 reels per month and ~2 photo posts.

Our engagement feels low for the follower count. Most posts land between 50–200 likes even though we have 11k followers. Interestingly, whenever we boost a post it performs extremely well (often 50k+ views and 1k+ likes), which makes me wonder if the content is good but just not getting organic reach.

We’ve also had a couple posts perform well organically:

  • one reel that hit 200k views / 14k likes because it featured a very specific unique piece
  • a reel introducing one of the owners and his background/story

Some constraints I’m dealing with:

  • I’m the only person making all the content
  • management doesn’t want to do influencer collaborations
  • they also don’t want to offer discounts, free items, or charity donations for exposure
  • most of our customers are tourists (70%+), so they’re not local repeat buyers

Another challenge is that because we use antique components, many pieces are one-of-a-kind, so if a post goes viral we often can’t replicate the exact item. I’m also starting to feel like the content is getting repetitive since most of it is “customer chooses pieces → we assemble → reveal the final result.”

Almost all of our sales happen in person at our market booth. Online orders are occasional, and DMs sometimes convert, but the website doesn’t capture the customization aspect very well.

My main questions:

  1. Does our engagement actually look low for an 11k account or is this normal right now?
  2. If you were in my position, what types of content would you experiment with beyond product assembly videos?
  3. Would you focus more on storytelling / brand personality rather than the product itself?
  4. Any ideas for marketing a business where most products are one-of-a-kind antiques?

I’d really appreciate any outside perspective.

Comments

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NairobiSpark•4 months ago•1

You're caught between a digital rock and a hard place. Seems like you're not getting enough support from your company on your role. Is there a marketing budget? This is necessary for quarterly planning of your digital marketing calendar.

As for engagement, reels work pretty great, especially via relatable content (fun, captivating, easygoing regular folks wearing your products) in different set-ups. Short form content will do great if you plan your scripts in advance.

Meantime, start job hunting for your own sanity.

Hope it works out for you!

Main_Lettuce_7314•4 months ago•1

Engagement doesn’t look “broken” for 11k, it just looks like you’ve maxed out one lane of content. Reels are solid, but right now everything is “watch us build” with no reason for people to talk back or come back. I’d layer in three things.

First, story-first reels: micro love stories, heirloom stories, “we turned her grandma’s broken locket into this,” staff favorites with why they’d wear it to a first date, wedding, breakup, etc. That taps the vintage/romantic fantasy way more than just assembly.

Second, interaction bait that isn’t cringe: “which would you steal?” A/B/C trays, “build this for a book heroine,” “pick a stone, I’ll tell you what era you’d thrive in.” Use polls and question stickers to feed ideas.

Third, education and process: sourcing trips, how you clean/assess antique pieces, what makes something Victorian vs art deco, pricing breakdowns.

For tools, I’ve used Later and Flick for this kind of testing; paid stuff like Hootsuite is overkill, while something like Pulse for Reddit sits in the background feeding me constant content prompts from real questions so I never run out of angles.

InspectionOld8756•4 months ago•1

To answer your question first: most full time creators definitely prefer long term partnerships.

One off deals are honestly pretty exhausting. You have to constantly pitch, review new contracts, and chase down invoices just for a single post. Long term deals mean stable income, way less admin work, and the promotion actually comes across as more authentic to the audience. Usually, creators just treat one offs as a trial run to see if the brand is a good fit before committing to a longer contract.

It really just comes down to offloading backend work to avoid burnout. You see the same mindset in other areas of the industry too, some people try to juggle all their own messaging and admin, while others team up with a US based OnlyFans agency like TDM Management to handle the daily backend tasks so they can actually focus on creating content.

At the end of the day, having reliable income and less paperwork is the ultimate goal.

ContentClawz•4 months ago•1

the niche-specific stuff tends to outperform everything else for small jewelry accounts. behind-the-scenes of the custom order process, where you show the actual gemstone selection or assembly, pulls way more saves than polished product shots. saves are the real signal for jewelry on instagram right now.

fewtechslater•4 months ago•1

that specific issue with manual workflows is a grind. worked on a 10 year dev cycle where we realized simple is usually better. is it just a UI thing or is the core logic failing you?

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