Instagram Growth & Content Manager, Grow Our Account From Zero

We're a U.S. digital marketing agency (Geek Powered Studios) that generates leads for home-services businesses (plumbing, HVAC, roofing, electrical). We're hiring someone to grow our own Instagram from near zero to 5,000-10,000 real, targeted followers, and to build the content engine that gets us there. This is not a scheduler or button-pusher role. You own the growth strategy, the content calendar, and the results. We're an agency ourselves, and we're hiring an individual freelancer to join our team, not another agency or a team reselling work. Solo operators only. What You'll Do - Build and execute a strategy to take our account from zero to 5,000-10,000 followers who match our ICP: home-services business owners, not random accounts - Create a monthly content calendar: post concepts, carousels, Reels ideas, images, and the captions and hooks that go with them - Produce engaging, scroll-stopping content that speaks directly to contractors and home-services owners - Manage and grow engagement daily: comments, DMs, community, hashtag and Explore strategy - Run paid boosts strategically. We have budget to accelerate growth, you decide what to boost, when, and why - Track what works, kill what doesn't, and report growth weekly in plain numbers - Once this account is winning, apply the playbook to additional accounts Must-Have Skills - 3+ years growing Instagram accounts, with at least one account you took from zero (or near zero) to 5,000+ followers, and proof you can show - Deep, CURRENT Instagram knowledge: Reels strategy, the 2025-2026 algorithm, Trial Reels, boosting vs. Ads Manager, what actually drives follows today. Old playbooks from 2021 won't cut it - Strong content instincts: hooks, captions, carousel structure, and visuals that stop the scroll - **AI fluency, the right way:** you use AI to ideate and produce faster, then push it until it's sharp and human. Not raw AI output or lightly massaged slop - Strong written English (your captions are the product) - Able to overlap U.S. Central business hours Bonus Points - You've grown accounts in B2B, trades, or home services - You can design finished carousels and edit Reels yourself (Canva, CapCut, or similar) - Experience turning followers into leads: DMs, lead magnets, profile funnels Who This Is Not For - **Agencies or teams reselling work.** We're an agency, we want an individual freelancer. You personally do the work, no subcontracting, no account managers, no handing it to a team. We work directly with you, every day, over Slack. - Follower farmers. If your growth playbook is buying followers, engagement pods, or follow/unfollow tricks, do not apply. We want real, targeted followers who can become clients. - Schedulers who post what they're handed and call it strategy - Anyone who can't show a real zero-to-thousands growth story, or can't overlap U.S. Central hours To Apply, Read Carefully (We Filter Hard) 1. **Start your proposal with this exact phrase: "Geeks grow grams."** If it's missing, we skip you. It tells us you actually read this. 2. Share 2-3 Instagram accounts you personally grew, with context: starting point, ending point, timeframe, and your role. Include a screenshot of IG Insights or account analytics from at least one (hard to fake, easy if it's real). 3. Record a 60-90 second Loom: introduce yourself, walk us through HOW you grew one of those accounts (the strategy, not just the numbers), and mention one recent way you've used AI in your content workflow. 4. Confirm your available hours overlap U.S. Central business time. We care about real followers who turn into real clients, not vanity numbers. If you're a strong fit, we move fast: a short call, then a paid trial on our actual account.