How to find trending sounds/effects for Instagram Reels (it works for TikTok too)

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:: 00:00

Do you ever watch Instagram Reels and wonder how some creators seem to be onto the latest trending sounds and effects before anyone else is? Maybe you don't have a clue what trending sounds are or how they could help you get more eyes on your content, but you'd love to find out I'm Janet Murray, a content and online business strategist. And in this episode of the courageous content podcast,

:: 00:22

I share my tips on finding trending sounds for Instagram Reels. And many of these tips can be applied to TikTok too. And I also explained what trending sounds and effects actually are and why it's good to use them First off, if you haven't heard of trending sounds, here's a quick explainer, Instagram, and specifically Instagram real seems to be following in the footsteps of everything Tik TOK is doing.

:: 00:50

And if you haven't heard of TikTok or you don't know the platform very well, it was formerly known as musically. And that platform relied on sounds uploaded by users or RTS for use by other tick-tock creators. And these are often samples, remixes, mashups of popular songs, voiceovers and voice effects are popular team. And trending sounds often lead to trending dances.

:: 01:13

Although of course you don't have to indulge unless you really want to. And while no one truly knows how the algorithm works both on Instagram and TikTok, it's generally believed that videos that use trending sounds get better engagement and reach. So how do you find out what the latest trending sounds are before I dig into the tips, I want to firstly, points out that I'm recording this in March, 2022.

:: 01:38

So if you're listening in the future, some of the things that I'm saying may no longer be true. So do bear that in mind, if you're listening in the future. And also these are just my tips. You might have some even better tips than this. And if so, I would love to hear them. And I'll share with you how to get in touch at the end of the episode.

:: 01:57

So tip number one is to check out your competitors, look at the accounts of competitors in your industry or space who have big or engaged followings to find your competitors search topics. You know, your ideal customers or clients will be interested in him. So for example, if you were an expert in property investment, you can search for topics or questions. Your ideal clients might have so flips or rentals,

:: 02:20

property, investment risks, property versus shares, how to find an investment property. Just think about the kinds of things that your ideal followers might be searching for on the platform. And that's a great place to start. My second tip is to check out the trend reports on both Instagram and Tik TOK, both Instagram, and TikTok released a weekly report with their trending sounds.

:: 02:42

And these reports typically include a round up of the past. Week's trending filters, sounds, music, hashtags, and challenges, and sometimes highlight creators accounts that are using them. The great news is that the later blog has an ongoing blog posts that it updates every single week with these trends say, you can simply check in with those blog posts every single week.

:: 03:07

They do one for both Instagram and TikTok. And I'll link to both of those in the show notes. Another tip is to search hashtags that you feel are relevant to your ideal customers or clients. So if you sell cake making classes, then you might search up hashtags that you feel will be followed or hashtags that you know are followed by your ideal customers or clients.

:: 03:28

So it might relate to specific cake making. So, and you can tell here, I don't know much about making cakes, but it might relate specifically to certain techniques that you might use or certain types of equipment you might use, or certain styles of cake making or cake decorating, you know, your ideal customers or clients, and you know, the people that you want to follow you on Instagram.

:: 03:51

So definitely worth having a look. It's also worth having a look on your explore page on Instagram. And I explain this in a little bit more detail in my recent podcast episode, which was about Instagram updates for March. I'll link to that one in the show notes, but Instagram will basically serve you up what it thinks you're interested in based on who you're following,

:: 04:14

who are you engaging? Where's the kind of content that you're putting out. So just having a look on your explore page to see what Instagram is serving you up and crucially who's coming up top. So who's coming up in the top of your explore page. Also, who's coming up at the top of the hashtags that you're searching up. What reels are you seeing?

:: 04:33

They usually appear in the top right of your screen. And those most popular reels are most likely to be using the trending sounds or the sounds or features of the moment textbox equivalent of the explore page is the for you page. Again, it will serve you up what it thinks you're interested in. So again, it's just worth having a scroll through and seeing what's presented to you and a tip.

:: 04:56

Somebody gave me a while ago, which I thought was great. And it certainly rang true for me is if you see the same trending sound or the same feature, three times in a row, when you're scrolling through, that's usually a sign that that particular sound is trending and it might be worth jumping on that trend. I recently had a bit of a break from tech stock.

:: 05:15

And when I logged on again, after a few weeks off, I noticed this, it just kept serving me up. Dido's thank you over and over again. And that's what made me realize it was a trending sound. Another thing that I do this is my final tip is I follow trend experts on Tik TOK. So there's a couple of people I follow.

:: 05:34

I link to one of them in the show notes here's called, I think wave wild and their accounts are basically about breaking the new trending sounds and new trending features. So it's definitely worth following those sorts of people and checking in every day to see what they're talking about. They'll often highlight new sounds. They'll highlight new features when they're on the up, because they know how to spot the signs of something that's likely to start trending.

:: 06:03

There are some apps that you can sign up to that will tell you what the trending sounds are. These are paid for apps. One of them, which I have tried is called talk board, but I found they are a little bit mixed. And sometimes what they're saying about where things are in the chart. So we've actually a chart of trending sands will not always reflect what you're seeing on your app and this trending sound thing.

:: 06:27

It really reminds me of hashtags. It's one of those things where everybody wants the tech solution. Everybody wants me to recommend an app or some kind of resource that will just take the heavy lifting out of it. But as with hashtags, I found that with trending sounds, that manual is usually better because just because a particular sound is trending, that doesn't mean it's the right sound for you to use or the right voice effect for you to use for your audience.

:: 06:56

And in fact, I've certainly had some successful reels and some successful tech talks where I haven't used trending sounds. I've just picked out a song or picks out an effect that I think will really resonate with my audience. And I think there's a danger with this as there is with hashtags or scheduling platforms or anything that we perceived that might save us time, that we can end up being overly reliant on the tools rather than just using our common sense.

:: 07:24

Do you know what I'm scrolling through? And I've seen this song three times, or do you know what I've seen? Four people use that voice effect. And I think it's always important to remind yourself. I did do a podcast episode recently, which I linked to in the show notes, which was specifically about using hashtags in 2022. But I always come back to the fact that it's not called social media for nothing.

:: 07:45

And it is about interacting with people. It is about relationships and conversations. And if it was as easy as finding exactly the right app or exactly the right resource to tell us exactly what was trending exactly what the right hashtags were to use at a particular time, then it would wipe out a whole industry. We wouldn't need social media managers. We wouldn't need marketing people.

:: 08:08

We wouldn't need content marketing experts. And are they, some of these resources can be useful. Some of these strategies I've shared can be useful. Ultimately there are a few shortcuts and often the very best thing we can do is just to get on the app, see what people are doing, see what we think might work for our audience and just get on with it and not obsess about this stuff too much.

:: 08:31

So I think you found that useful as ever. I do love hearing from you and the best place to connect with me usually is on Instagram. I'm at Jan Murray UK. I'd love to know if you have any tips for finding 20 sounds and trending effects on Instagram or Tik TOK or both. I'd love to hear me.

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