Some collaborations start small and grow into something you’re genuinely proud of. This is one of them.
This case study covers an ongoing social media strategy and management partnership with an established Irish food brand — one that has relied on their online shop as their primary sales channel since day one. For confidentiality, the client is kept anonymous, but everything here is real, documented, and backed by data.
The Challenge
When I took on this project in 2020, the brand had just launched: an online shop, a product they believed in, and a handful of Instagram posts. No strategy, content system, community, or data to learn from: just a blank page and a lot of potential.
Building a social media presence from scratch is one thing. Doing it for a brand that sells exclusively online (where Instagram is essentially the front window, the word-of-mouth, and the sales funnel all at once) adds a different kind of pressure. Every piece of content needed to do real work: build trust with people who’d never heard of the brand, give existing customers a reason to come back, and move people from scrolling to buying.
We started in the middle of a pandemic, which shaped everything about how people were shopping, what they were paying attention to online, and what felt relevant to say. That context never really went away: it just kept moving over the years with platform algorithm shifts, industry and audience behaviour changes, and the brand evolving over time. Nearly six years in, the strategy has had to adapt continuously to stay effective.
The Approach
In this case, the strategy has never been about getting more followers for the sake of it or going viral. I have always been focused on building something sustainable instead: a community that trusts the brand, returns to buy, and tells others about it.
That’s meant focusing on the metrics that actually connect to sales: profile visits, link clicks, CTR to the website, and social proof. It’s meant creating content that speaks to a specific audience rather than chasing trends. And it’s meant staying consistent through everything the past few years have thrown at us.
The work covers strategy, content planning, photography, videography, caption writing, and scheduling — but community management has been just as central to the approach as any piece of content. Every DM gets a reply and every customer tag or mention gets acknowledged. For a brand without a shopfront, the way people feel when they interact with the account is part of the product experience and over the years, that consistency builds the kind of audience that recommends you without being asked.
Seasonal campaigns have been a consistent part of the calendar — Christmas, Easter, limited edition launches, brand milestones: each one was planned with a clear goal and adapted from year to year based on what the data shows.
The Results
Before the numbers: a small note on what to look for here — and why.
Most people instinctively look at follower counts and reach when evaluating social media performance. Those numbers matter, but for a brand that sells through an online shop, what really matters is whether the content is moving people from Instagram to the website. That’s what CTR measures.
CTR (click-through rate) here refers to the percentage of people who visited the profile and then clicked the link in bio. Industry benchmarks are currently at 2–3% on average. The figures below consistently exceed that, often by a significant margin.
It’s also worth mentioning that Instagram organic performance has become significantly harder in recent years. Industry data shows engagement was down approximately 24% year over year in 2025, with reach tightening and growth slowing across all account sizes. Delivering consistent CTR and website traffic in that environment is a different challenge from what it was in 2020.
All results below are from organic content. A brief period of paid advertising was used in the early days of the account, but it has not been part of the strategy in recent years.
Over the past 12 months, the account generated 448,000 total views through organic content alone. The top performing individual posts reached up to 4,500 views for a single static post, with multiple posts in the 3,000–4,000 views range and many more in the 2,000–3,000 range — consistent, sustained performance built over time.
Within that period, a three-month window stood out as the strongest in the account’s recent history. For a relatively small page, the numbers were outstanding: an average CTR of 31.4% across those three months, well above the industry benchmark of 2–3%. The peak month delivered:
71,671 views — 1,843 profile visits — 644 link in bio clicks — CTR 34.9%
And that peak month was typically one of the slowest months of the year.
Social proof content: a consistent top converter
Review and testimonial posts have been among the most effective content types across the entire collaboration, driving more profile visits and link clicks relative to reach than almost anything else.
A single review post reached 15,653 views and drove 41 link clicks. Another reached 3,197 views with 28 link clicks and 39 profile visits. This pattern has repeated consistently across years: people trust what others say about a brand, and the data backs that up.
Link in bio performance — selected highlights:
- peak months with 644 and 547 link in bio clicks in a single month
- 1,000+ link in bio clicks over a 3-month period with a CTR of 31%
- 187 link in bio clicks in a 5-day window
- Individual static posts regularly driving 28–41 link clicks, plus profile visits and follows
- CTR figures across campaigns ranging from 7.5% to 49.6%
- A seasonal campaign that delivered the strongest link traffic in the brand’s history to that point, thanks to a refreshed strategy
Stories have also been a consistent source of direct traffic: individual Stories and sequences regularly driving meaningful link clicks in addition to the feed and bio link performance above.
Conclusion
The brands that see the best results from social media are rarely the ones chasing overnight growth. They’re the ones that show up consistently, adapt when things change, and build something real with their audience over time.
This collaboration started in the middle of a pandemic, survived every algorithm change Instagram has thrown at us since, and has kept delivering above-average CTR and consistent website traffic through all of it because the strategy has always been focused on what actually matters for this brand’s business, not what looks good on paper.
Nearly 1,000 new organic followers in the past 12 months, 448,000 organic views, CTR figures that consistently outperform industry benchmarks, and a community that buys, returns, and recommends: that’s what a long-term social media strategy looks like in practice.
If you run a food, drink, or wellness brand and you want social media strategy and management that are focused on the right results (website traffic, community, brand awareness, consistent sales) rather than follower counts and trends, I’d love to hear about what you’re working on.
I’ve been working with brands for nearly a decade, managing everything from strategy and content creation to community management and seasonal campaigns. Based in Dublin, I work remotely with brands across Ireland and internationally.
A MATTER OF NOURISHMENT 