DM Automation: 6 Steps To Make $15,297/Instagram Post

Harnessing Instagram DM Automation

I took this e-commerce brand from making $0 every time they posted on Instagram to making $15,000/post in just two weeks. 

And that is organically, without spending an extra cent on ads.

Technically, my team did that, so if we haven’t met, I’m Liz.

Since 2019, I’ve been running a DFY AI chatbot agency on a mission to change how online brands monetize their Instagram and Facebook channels, one conversation at a time. 

On this blog, I share strategies that help my clients drive traffic, gain leads, and make money with automated DMs.

So, whether you have 10,000 followers, 100,000 followers, or 1 million followers, in this article, I’ll walk you through how to start building 1-1 relationships with your followers (and non-followers).

How Instagram Direct Messages Build Personal Connections 

I will walk you through the 6-step process we deployed to help this e-commerce brand. 

You'll see how they went from a rented audience to an owned one. 

In other words, from potential customers to loyal customers on a monetizable email list that fosters personal-level connections.

Make sure you read until the end because step 6 gives you a 20% purchase rate—a total game changer. 

I wanted to show off one of our clients who did not have a massive following on social media platforms.

They had 15,000 followers on Instagram and 8,000 followers on Facebook. 

And they were real followers, not bought; they weren't built when the brand was putting out a different type of content. 

They were engaged people following them and interested in their product and e-commerce store.

Like many online businesses, their content strategy consisted of Instagram stories, reels, and feed posts featuring their product.

Or user-generated content.

About 2-10 people commented on their posts.

Not bad, but there was no strategy to encourage people to engage in any other way.

So, they weren’t learning about their audience or what followers wanted to see from them.

And ultimately, they couldn't drive sales, so they were leaving money on the table.

Here's what they did to change this.

Step-by-Step Instagram Account Growth and Monetization

Step 1: We mapped out an initial Instagram marketing strategy around their marketing calendar to hype their audience about upcoming product launches.

This plan allowed us to understand what people were interested in and what questions they had pre-purchase.

Step 2: We deployed our proprietary AI chat system in the back end of their DMs.

Whenever people commented on their posts or gave story replies with a keyword trigger, an auto-reply took over and started a conversation via direct message. 

We spent the last few years perfecting this automated response system.

We used Manychat, our own software, Make, and Open AI.

Step 3: We made some tweaks to their content structure. 

We had them model our creative guidelines and put up a first post teasing their upcoming collection drop.

Users could only access exclusive content about this collection by commenting on a keyword on that post and then checking their Instagram DMs for access.

But before getting full access, they had to give us their email address first.

Making Instagram Automation Juice Worth The Squeeze

Here’s the exciting part: their email address AND whatever they tapped inside the chat synced to the email service provider.

So, not only is this brand now in front of this audience via two channels, DMs on Instagram and email, but both experiences feature a much more personal touch. 

We know exactly what products they’re interested in and the most common questions asked before buying. 

We now have a direct line of communication with them through Instagram auto-replies. 

But compared to before, we also have a highly engaged email segment.

Step 4: The following week, they modeled a different creative guideline that we have to promote a discount code, and they put up a second post. 

To claim this unique discount code, people had to (you guessed it) re-engage and comment on a specific word in that post.

Then, check their Instagram DMs. 

Once in the DMs, if the chatbot already had their email address, it skipped asking for it.

If it didn’t have their email, it prompted them to type it to unlock their personalized discount.

We collected as many emails as possible, with as little friction as possible.

The discount code was unique to the user and expired in 24 hours. 

Literally, use it or lose it.

For example, my discount code, which contains my name (Liz), expired in 24 hours after I unlocked it inside the conversation.

Instantly adding scarcity pushed more people to buy immediately.

Step 5: In the next 24 hours, before the coupon expired, the chatbot followed up with automated responses to showcase testimonials and answer frequently asked questions.

Or offer to connect users who haven’t bought yet to an actual human to see if they could assist them through checkout.

Step 6: the secret behind getting 20% of all Instagram users who started a chat to place an order in the next three weeks after the initial conversation.

Drum roll, please...

Get Higher Conversion with Instagram DM Automated Follow-ups

The bot continued to nurture, educate, entertain, and start new value-driven conversations.

It made different offers to people who hadn’t placed an order, personalizing the offer to everyone’s interest. 

Remember the first post, which collected insight into what product each user is interested in? 

Talk about enhancing the customer experience, wink.

The final numbers?

89.01% of all users who engaged with the automated DMs gave us their email addresses.

20.43% of them purchased in the next three weeks.

Why Automated Messages Work: Insights and Outcomes

Why does this work so well?

1. This brand saw the potential of AI and automated Instagram DMs and how this could scale 100s of conversations simultaneously.
2. They were open to changing their content structure and sales funnel.
3. Instead of using the same old images of their products and Instagram posts, they now focus on the audience.
4. What did the audience WANT? How could they LEARN more about their audience? How can they SERVE their audience better?
5. They led with value by educating their audience and personalizing experiences to each user by answering their questions in soft, two-way communication.

Instead of the usual buy-buy-buy method, they built stronger relationships (although reached by sending automated messages) that added a more human touch.

And by the way, if users are not interested, they can always stop these messages by saying, “No thanks, maybe later, not right now.”

As a bonus, the business also started getting more organic reach from Instagram content, which we usually see with this type of content and technology. 

When they went from 2-10 comments/post to 400-1000 comments per post, Instagram started pushing their content more. 

Based on their insights so far, they have had a 41% increase in organic reach only from two initial posts.

Imagine doing this continuously, with most of your marketing calendar or ideas.

In this article, I showcased ONLY ONE way to capture people in automated DM conversations: the Instagram post. 

If you want to learn about eight MORE ways (including a paid one, Instagram story, or Instagram profile), check out this video here, or follow us for more content on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.