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"I Want to Grow My Instagram Following. Help!"

Help Wanted

Tue Jan 13 2026

Summary

Help Wanted (Money News Network)

Episode: "I Want to Grow My Instagram Following. Help!"

Date: January 13, 2026
Hosts: Jason Feifer & Nicole Lapin

Episode Overview

In this episode, hosts Jason Feifer (Entrepreneur Editor-in-Chief) and money expert Nicole Lapin tackle a modern work dilemma: how to grow an Instagram following with short-form video, especially when you don’t feel like a “native” creator. Jason seeks advice from Nicole, who has amassed an impressive following (807,000 Instagram followers at the time of recording), despite her self-professed aversion to making constant video content. The conversation is an energetic, honest, and practical look at strategy—from pinning posts to batching and bucketing content, finding what works natively on the platform, and dealing with changes in social media algorithms.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why Bother With Short-Form Video?

Timestamps: 03:38 – 09:20

Jason confesses to not being a fan of short-form video, neither as a consumer nor creator, citing it as “boring” and unmemorable.
Despite his personal dislike, Jason realizes the career necessity after hearing from Vanessa Van Edwards (Science of People) how short-form video dramatically grew her audience, reputation, and speaking business.
- Quote (Jason, 06:49):
  “She said that short-form video success has significantly improved her overall business...corporate clients are even more eager to book her...their employees follow her on social media...it gives her more leverage.”
Jason’s own success with text-posts on LinkedIn declined after algorithm changes; he resolves to focus seriously on short-form video to keep driving opportunities.

2. Where to Find (and How to Make) Video Content

Timestamps: 09:50 – 13:00

Jason shares Vanessa’s three content-source buckets:
1. Podcast clips – “Tape your podcasts...that’s content.”
2. Speaking gigs – “Get somebody to cut up your talks.”
3. Direct-to-camera bulk shooting – “Just bulk shoot a ton of...short-form stuff...You do that and you’ll have a video a day and you’ll start blowing up.”
  — (Jason, 09:40)
Nicole cautions that AI clipping tools (like Opus) can be helpful but are often inferior to human editors: “A lot of them, for the most part, don’t live up to the hype.” (12:32)

3. Pinning & Validating Content on Instagram

Timestamps: 13:15 – 18:45

Nicole and Jason do a live audit of Jason’s Instagram, focusing on which posts should be pinned for maximum credibility.
- Nicole insists Jason unpin “validator” content (a photo at the NASDAQ billboard, Michelle Pfeiffer holding his book) in favor of his highest-view videos.
- Quote (Nicole, 16:46):
  “Actually I think the validation on social media...is the view count.…That’s your best-performing social content.”
They discuss “native validation,” or how social proof on Instagram is less about credentials and more about engagement and reach.

4. Buckets, Batching, and Scripting—Organizing Your Process

Timestamps: 20:28 – 34:32

Nicole details her robust system for “feeding the beast” of daily content:
- Keeps a live document (Google Sheets) of ideas broken down by content bucket:
  - Green screen monologues
  - Stitches (reacting to others’ videos)
  - Trends
  - Collabs/skits
  - Text-over-video moments
- Uses batching: Tapes all content for the week in one or two days, frequently changing outfits to create variety.
- Scripts are printed and taped to her ring light for skits and monologues.
- Editors help with technical work, like keying out backgrounds for green screen.
Quote (Nicole, 21:13):
“I have a running document that I keep throughout the week of stuff...I break my document down and I title it like ‘shooting schedule for the week of...’”
Quote (Jason, 24:22):
“Instagram has recently rejiggered its algorithm to reward videos that are rewatched...that’s also what’s amplifying those short seven-second videos.”

5. What Kinds of Short Videos Actually Work

Timestamps: 25:45 – 30:09

Carousels: Image-based listicles are trending up for engagement.
Text over quick B-roll: Nicole finds mundane B-roll with a large block of overlaid text explaining a news item or idea consistently goes viral, even if it's visually unimpressive.
- Quote (Nicole, 27:00):
  “It looks like garbage...and it was shared like, five million, 2.5 million [times].”
The “reveal” format performs well—countdown lists or numbered secrets, especially with trending audio.

6. Lead Gen, Organization & Systemizing

Timestamps: 30:13 – 33:33

Nicole uses ManyChat to convert engagement, with comment triggers that DM users educational resources.
She organizes content to be repurposed into Instagram Highlights (“mini playlists”) by category.
- Quote (Nicole, 32:50):
  “If I’m finding you for the first time...what’s the best of?...Highlights as like little mini playlists.”

7. Ownership Beats Outsourcing and Consistency Trumps Perfection

Timestamps: 33:33 – 36:08

Despite the workload, Nicole believes personally scripting and ideating content gets the best results versus agency or template-based systems.
Imperfect, scrappy, or spontaneous content (even with typos and messiness) tends to outperform highly produced, agency-crafted videos.
- Quote (Nicole, 34:32):
  “Only once I really took over every aspect of it has the growth truly...the 800, whatever thousand you’ve seen, has...[exploded].”

8. Time Investment & Emotional Reality

Timestamps: 36:08 – 41:30

Producing high-quality short-form content is a major time commitment and a mental load that Nicole admits is “too much time,” estimating much of her Sunday goes into scripting and scheduling.
Jason acknowledges he feels “overwhelmed” by the work and learning ahead, but trusts his ability to pattern-match and find a rhythm.
- Quote (Jason, 38:40):
  “I feel a little overwhelmed. But also, I know this is doable...I have this theory about people...every human being has the same skill set, and that skill set is pattern matching...This is just a pattern I have never been excited to pick up.”
- Quote (Jason, 41:23):
  “I’m just gonna text you all the time, and I’m just gonna say, ‘I fucking hate that I’m making this video.’ And you’re gonna say, that’s okay. I fucking hate that I’m making this video, too. And then we’re gonna make some videos, and it’ll all be okay.”

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Short-Form Skepticism:
“I do not enjoy watching short form video...I find it boring...It’s like spending an hour doing nothing.”
— Jason Feifer (05:43)
On Social Proof:
“What is actually validation? It hurts your ego because, like, the ones that I’ve pinned were like a random day that I put on a hat... But those are the ones when people stumble on you, that’s your best performing social content.”
— Nicole Lapin (16:46)
On Batching and Scripting:
“I create a script, I print it out, and then I tape it to the side of my ring light.”
— Nicole Lapin (38:14)
On Authenticity and Messiness:
“Whoever you hire, whatever agency, as much as you pay, it’s never going to be as good as if you do it...that’s the stuff that does better than if somebody beautifully curates whatever that content is.”
— Nicole Lapin (33:34)
On Mindset and Process:
“The exhaustion is the amount that I need to absorb to feel like I’m full of ideas to then be able to do this...But I know that I need to do it.”
— Jason Feifer (40:18)

Actionable Takeaways

Audit your existing social presence: Pin only your best-performing native content (usually high-view Reels), not “credential” posts.
Start with content you’re already making: Use podcast clips and talk recordings as social video seeds.
Organize in buckets and batch shoot: Create a weekly content schedule using categories like green screen, stitches, trends, collabs, skits, carousels, and text-over-B-roll.
Don’t overthink “perfect” editing: Messy, personality-driven, timely posts often outperform slick studio work.
Use tools to prompt DMs and nurture leads: Incorporate features like ManyChat to pull social media followers into your ecosystem.
Set manageable and consistent goals: Start aiming for daily posts (or batch them) to “feed the beast” without overwhelming yourself.

This episode offers a real, unfiltered look at what it takes to grow on Instagram in the short-form era—delivering not just process, but clear-eyed encouragement for busy professionals who feel out of place (and out of love) with the relentless pressure of social media.

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Transcript

Jason Pfeiffer (0:00)

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Nicole Lapin (1:29)

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Jason Pfeiffer (2:54)

This is Help Wanted, the show that makes your work work for you. I'm Jason Pfeiffer, editor in chief of.

Nicole Lapin (3:00)

Jason Pfeiffer (6:35)

Yeah. And I mean, I do this thing with my kid who watches YouTube shorts all day, every day, where after he'll be on, I'll like, pull him off the iPad after he's on for an hour, and I will tell him, I'll say, tell me one video that you just watched. Like you just watched an hour's worth of video. Tell me about one of them. And he can't because they're not memorable. None of them are memorable. So I don't enjoy it as a consumer. Again, that's why I find it boring. It's like spending an hour doing nothing. But I know that people watch it. And this very, very compelling thing happened to me. And this is the reason, this is what, this is what fired me up about short form video was I was just in San Diego and I was speaking at Limitless Live, which is a conference put on by my friend Jim Quick, maybe our friend of the show. Yes, there you go. And. And it was wonderful. And I was backstage and I was talking to a friend of mine whose name is Vanessa Van Edwards, who has a company called Science of People, and she absolutely kills it. And she told me that this year in 2025, she really committed to short form video and her following exploded. She is now getting stopped for selfies when she's like, out with her kids. It's crazy, but the thing that really jumped out at me was she said that, that the short form video success has significantly improved her overall business. And a big reason for that is because corporate clients are, are even more eager than they were before. And they were already very eager to book her, but they're even more eager. And the reason. And to spend all sorts of money on her. And the reason is because their employees follow her on social media and so they'll announce that they booked her for an event and then they'll get a ton of emails from their employees being like, oh, my God, I'm so excited. I follow Vanessa on Instagram and that makes it a success for them and that gives her more leverage. And I heard that and I thought, holy crap. Like, I cannot believe I slept on that. Because what I had been doing was investing all my time on LinkedIn. And in 2024, that worked really well for me. Like, my LinkedIn was blowing up and it really leaned into my strengths as a writer because LinkedIn posts are primarily text. I mean, LinkedIn wants you to do video, but it doesn't perform that well. So I was primarily text and it was doing really well. And then as a result, my 2025 speaking. So like 2024, I blew up on LinkedIn. 2025, my speaking business was, was on fire. But then LinkedIn changed its algorithm and my reach in 2025 on LinkedIn was significantly depressed. And now my speaking calendar in 2026 is softer than it was in 2025. I mean, I'm still getting bookings, but, like, not like I was in 2025. And I think there's a direct connection. And so now I'm feeling like I, I need to understand short form video and I need to commit to it. And I've been having all sorts of voice memo exchanges with Vanessa is, here's the way to do it. Tape your podcasts. That's content. Get somebody to like, cut up your talks, video of your talks into short form, and like, that's content. And then also just bulk shoot a ton of like, direct to camera short form stuff and have somebody edit it. And that's content. She's like, you do that and you'll have a video a day and you'll start blowing up. And I started to feel anxious. I was like, I cannot. Like, I wasted years not doing this and I need to start doing it now. But also, I don't really know. And so I look at your stuff and, and I say, I have Nicole I talk to her all the time. She is killing it on Instagram and maybe TikTok too. I don't know. I don't look at TikTok. And you're making all these videos and I know that you don't like, this is not your favorite thing in the world. And so I want to know what you are doing and. And how I can do it.