Creators love and hate Instagram. While everyone is up there, very few enjoy being there. The platform constantly changes the way it prioritizes work and bans ads without any reason. I am one of the unlucky people to have to go through such a ban. It’s worse than I thought. Waking up in the morning, ready to start a new day, I sit down to eat breakfast and open Instagram. It freezes and then says, “account has been disabled”. Frustrated, I went online looking for a solution. My day has been ruined and I really feel like I’ve lost a limb. The scale of the tragedy was out of scale.
You can say, “He’s such a Gen-Z, I use MySpace and ModelMayhem for work”, and good for you! I use Instagram, although honestly, I wouldn’t use it if it weren’t for that. Scrolling Instagram in the morning isn’t a habit I’m particularly proud of, but I’ve gotten used to checking what Vogue is up to date, new images my editor has made, as well as catching up. keep up with any work related messages.
Not being able to do work via Instagram is a loss. If you want to know, I spend more time checking out the Vogue Runway app to see what’s on fashion than scrolling through Instagram memes. However, I recently started checking Facebook for Fstoppers memes, which are hilarious.
Long story short, I’m not banned. But I learned a lot in the 7 days that wreaked havoc on Instagram. Here are some things that I highly recommend you do. I never thought I would get banned until I woke up and such.
Lesson 1: There are many ways to contact people
As mentioned, I use Instagram for work. The same goes for most ads. Even the old-schoolers who were famous in the 70s and 80s have Instagram to this day. It’s pretty easy to find an ad using Instagram. I found the crew for my first photo shoot there. Why bother with digging into people’s info if you can just look them up on Instagram and slide into DM. 
Once I had established a good network there, I constantly relied on it to get new jobs. There are very few phone numbers I collect, mostly Instagram tags. This creates a bubble waiting to burst. As the network grows, it becomes more valuable. When I was banned, I lost everything.
Thank goodness I have a few good friends who know everyone in the city’s industry. Note: you must know the hyperlinks, they will save your life. I called them right away and asked for the phone numbers of the people I was going to dial with. Dozens of embarrassing “I’m banned” calls afterward. 
What I learned from this experience is that you should never put your eggs in one basket. The safest way to keep a good network is to use a database or just the contacts app on your phone. Assuming your phone is backed up, you’re much less likely to lose information. Whenever you’re working with someone new, ask for their phone number, Instagram, email, and any other information they’re willing to provide. Record, save and don’t rely on Instagram tags.
Lesson 2: Don’t rely on one platform to showcase your work and reach your audience
Just looking at the reach, Instagram is the biggest of them all. It’s also free. Sure, I could put billboards with my picture around the city and get more reach, but that would cost a lot of money. The same goes for Instagram ads, although they help increase my reach I need to pay for them.
When I lost Instagram, it lost the audience it had. Even though I didn’t amass a huge following on it, it was a huge amount of people who hired me. Not being able to recommend my stuff to people who want to buy it is also a huge loss. I also have no other way to do it. 
The lesson I’ve learned is that there should be a backup way to reach certain people as far as show work. One of the best and easiest ways to do that is to have a mailing list. I’ve started adding emails to my mailing list manually and sending them out quarterly. You should find another way to present your work to the audience.
this is a illyaovchar.com site that you can find and browse, but it is designed to be a portfolio and not a feed of new images, so this would not be a good way to approach audience. Also, the photographer’s websites are not often visited, so it won’t replace mailing lists or Instagram.
The good side of being banned
There is a good side to this disruption from Instagram. It allowed me to rethink the way I market my work, as well as create backups to reach my clients and creative network. It also allows me to compile this article, which is hopefully a valuable lesson for dear readers. 
On a personal note, not having Instagram allowed me to switch from texting to ringing people. It seems that now with the comfort of texts, few people bother to call, which is a shame as far as I’m concerned. Now I’m just for calling and not texting. Calling takes less time and also allows for a proper conversation. While it may sound old-fashioned, I appreciate the lively quick dialogue that everyone cheering brings. Just a note of etiquette, always allow people to get off the call by starting the conversation with “can you talk now?”. The better you are, the more people are looking for. In a way, it’s a yardstick to gauge your level of respect among your peers.
overall
All in all, being banned from Instagram, although temporary, has changed the way I work with people. I’m grateful to whoever chose to ban me on Instagram, you’ve helped me spend less time on your platform and rely on better and more effective methods to reach the people I need. Writing this article, I strongly recommend that you follow the advice in it. It’s like having a spare drive: you think it won’t happen to you until it does.
