My current instagram account has over 11,000 followers and I’m starting over. I’m writing a blog post on this topic so I don’t have to answer the same question a million times: “why in the heck are you staring a new account?”
The History of My Instagram Account
If you have been around my account long enough, you will know that it started as a general fitness account back in 2018 with the name ‘meagafit’. I posted to it for 2 years, and had gained around 900 followers. I then got into physical therapy school, stopped posting to my account and thought I would never start it back up.
My last clinical rotation of graduate school was at a pelvic floor private practice clinic here in Chicago, IL. My mentor knew I had plans of opening my own clinic one day. She said, “if I can only give you one piece of advice, it would be to have a social media account to get your name out there.” Crap.
Imposter Syndrome
So, I took the easy way out. I figured I would just start back up my old, but dead instagram account that has just been sitting there for years. I was way too afraid to post anything related to physical therapy because at the time I was just finishing my last year of physical therapy school. Imposter syndrome is so real, I did not feel I was qualified enough to post anything about physical therapy or pelvic floor physical therapy for that matter.
So I continued with the fitness niche, knowing so well I wanted to do pelvic floor. One viral post later and my account grew to 11,000 followers in two weeks in March/April of 2023. This was exciting for about 1 day. The problem? I didn’t want to be posting general fitness content!! Overtime I became more comfortable posting about the pelvic floor and had gained my confidence via other pelvic floor physical therapist’s on the internet reaching out to me and applauding me for my content. I guess I needed some external validation from the expert’s themselves. I then transitioned my account to ‘thepelvicconfidencedoc’.
Business 101: Don’t Have All of Your Eggs in One Basket
Ever since June of 2023, I have been contemplating starting a new account. But how could I just leave behind 11,000 followers? A vanity metric I know, but it’s a vanity metric that gives you authority in the online space. Why continue to post to an account I don’t feel excited to show up for because I know that half of my followers could probably care less about their pelvic floor health? So I decided it’s finally time to commit to myself, take a chance, and just follow through with my desire to start a new account where I can show up as myself, posting the content I love to post, and knowing I deserve to feel confident in my abilities as a pelvic floor physical therapist to share my knowledge online.
The problem? I had all of my eggs in one basket, instagram. As of Thanksgiving 2023, I had a little over 200 tiktok followers. Not impressive when you’re trying to run an online business. So, I decided it was time to focus on tiktok before making the transition to a new instagram account. Something I should have done from the beginning. In that time I have gained over 7,000 tiktok followers and at around 5,000 followers I told myself it’s time to finally start over on instagram.
This Isn’t About Vanity Metrics
You might be thinking I’m making a big deal out of a vanity metric, but vanity metrics are essential when it comes to sponsorships and brand collaborations. The brand sponsorships have been critical in getting my online business going. I invest all of the money earned from sponsorships back into my business. If it weren’t for my sponsors, I wouldn’t have been able to pay for a business mentor who was able to get my virtual coaching business up and running.
So, by starting over and losing my big following, I lost my sponsorships (or at least they’ve been put on pause). To put this into perspective, the most I ever got paid for one post was $800 and I was on a $1,400 per month contract for another company (add a zero or two more for the huge creators). This isn’t to flex, this is to demonstrate that 11,000 followers is more than a vanity metric. My business is taking a huge hit by starting over. So with starting over I not only lose a large portion of my revenue, I lose my authority on instagram, which could lead to less virtual clients as well.
I’m Doing This For me
If you don’t think I’m crazy yet, you probably should! At the end of the day, I just felt like I couldn’t show up how I wanted to show up on instagram. I need to put myself and the longevity of my business first. It has technically only been a little over 1 year since I (re)started this endeavor. In the grand scheme of things, 5, 10, 20 years down the road, this won’t matter. Yes, I might be taking a huge hit now. But this is only temporary. I believe my new account will be better than my old one ever could have been because I’m putting authenticity at the fore front, something I was afraid to do with my old account from the get go. I couldn’t be more excited to show up for you guys and post what I love and am most passionate about: the female lifespan and how to optimize our pelvic floor health at every stage!
Thank you for your time and consideration!! To support me in this endeavor, follow @thepelvicconfidencedoc on instagram.