Instagram Audience Insights
Turn real Instagram data into a read on what is working: which posts in your niche are traveling right now and why, and how any account (yours or a competitor's) actually performs. This is the read layer, so the skill sees real numbers instead of guessing.
One honest limit: Instagram caps and cookie-gates who liked or commented on someone else's post, so a liker or commenter roster is not reliably available for other accounts. The signal here is niche post performance + profile stats, which is what you can actually read on Instagram.
When to use
- "What is working in my niche / scan the #hashtag"
- "Pull the stats for this account / how big is this competitor"
- "What format is traveling under this hashtag right now"
- "Compare my follower count to this account"
Not for writing a caption (use ig-caption-writer) or planning a carousel (use ig-carousel-planner).
Setup (optional)
The read layer uses Apify (no login, no cookies). Get a free token at https://console.apify.com/account/integrations and set APIFY_TOKEN. No token? Paste the posts or profile stats you already have and the skill runs the same analysis on them.
Input
- A niche hashtag (with or without the
#), a username (yours or a competitor's), or both - Optional: the goal (niche pulse / competitor read / self benchmark)
Output
- Niche pulse - the top posts under a hashtag ranked by engagement, with the pattern behind the winners (hook shape, caption length, image vs carousel vs Reel, presence of a question or a specific number)
- Profile read - the stats for a handle: followers, post count, bio, category, verified and business flags
- Benchmark - your account against a competitor on follower count and post cadence, normalized so a small account's breakout is not buried under a big account's average
- Action list - what format to make more of, which accounts to watch, what to route to
ig-caption-writerorig-carousel-planner
Steps
- Pull the data. For a niche:
lib.ApifyClient().fetch_niche_posts(hashtag, max_items=20). For a profile:fetch_profile(username). Falls back to pasted data if no token. - Rank by engagement. Sort the niche posts by likes + comments. Normalize against the owner's reach where known so a mega-account's average does not crowd out a small account's breakout.
- Extract the pattern. For the top posts, name what they share: the hook shape (question, confession, list, data-point), the caption length, image vs carousel vs Reel, the presence of a specific number. That is the repeatable part.
- Read the profile. From
fetch_profile, report followers, post count, bio, category, and whether it is a verified business account. Use it to benchmark, not to guess private engagement. - Benchmark honestly. Compare handles on the stats Instagram exposes (followers, post count, cadence). Do not imply access to a liker or commenter list for accounts you do not own.
- Build the action list. Make-more-of (the winning format), watch (specific accounts), route drafts to
ig-caption-writer/ig-carousel-planner. - Deliver the report in the Output shape, with the raw ranked posts and profile stats attached.
What the read layer exposes
| Method | Returns |
|---|---|
fetch_niche_posts(hashtag, max_items) |
top posts under a hashtag: caption, likes, comments, owner, type, url |
fetch_profile(username) |
profile stats: username, followers, following, posts, bio, category, verified, business |
Hard rules
Global voice rules: see root SKILL.md Voice rules. Additional skill-specific rules:
- Be honest that Instagram hides who liked or commented on other accounts. This is niche discovery + profile stats, not a liker or engager roster. Do not imply otherwise.
- Normalize by follower count before calling a post a winner, or you extract "big account" effects, not "good post" effects.
- Never invent a post, a number, or a pattern. If a hashtag returns thin, say so and try an adjacent tag or pull known accounts.
- A pattern is only a pattern if it recurs across several top posts, not one.
Related skills
ig-caption-writer- write more of what the niche data shows is workingig-carousel-planner- turn a winning format into a slide planig-hook-extractor- reverse-engineer the hook from a top-performing postig-hashtag-strategist- size the hashtag set around the tags that are travelingig-content-planner- feed the winning patterns into a weekly plan
