10M followers: How Charles Leclerc grew his Instagram audience by 64% in one year

RESULTS:

*According to data from CrowdTangle and Meta. Results are not identically repeatable and generally expected individual results will differ.

**Results provided by the partner.

STRATEGY:

A professional racing driver from Monaco, Charles Leclerc began karting at a young age and quickly rose through the ranks, winning multiple junior titles before making his championship debut in 2018. Since then he has raced over 100 times, with 24 podiums, and at 25 years of age, he is widely regarded as one of the most exciting talents in the sport.

With the emergence of Reels on Instagram, Charles looked to utilize short-form video to keep fans informed and engaged whilst traveling around the globe. Interest in the sport has skyrocketed in the last 12 months and Charles’s reels–from the celebratory to the hilarious–have helped make him one of the most popular athletes on Instagram.

In fact, it was in 2021 that Charles set precise goals across social media as his star rose and he found himself expanding his comms team:

The team, hand-in-hand with Charles, came up with a strategy that has proven both scalable and highly sticky. Their production and distribution cadence around race weekends in tandem with a personality-infused content strategy have pushed beyond the traditional boundaries of Charles sport–and fans cannot get enough: In 2022 alone, Charles’s Instagram grew by nearly 4M followers and his weekly reels accumulated 80M Plays.

The following interview with Charles and his social lead, Sarynna Servello, has been edited and condensed for clarity. May this detailed playbook serve as inspiration for athletes across disciplines on how to cultivate, grow and engage a dedicated community.

Meta: Charles's Instagram account has grown by nearly 4M followers this past year. To what do you attribute this monumental growth?

Servello: Without Reels, our growth would not have been what it is. The entire industry is shifting towards short-form, people are looking for quick, snackable videos to consume and enjoy.

Reels help with (1) discoverability, people like Charles who are huge elsewhere can be discovered by the US market more quickly thanks to reels, and (2) connection, relating to his audience by showing that personal side of him.

Photos don’t capture the emotion after the race or on the podium, or while chatting with fans, the way that reels do. So we thought, “How can we showcase an emotional or important moment, especially around big races? We lean into Reels.”

“My key piece of advice: Be yourself, this is always the most important thing,” adds Charles. “I try to use my Instagram to show the person that I am for those who don’t know me personally.”

How involved is Charles in the content strategy and in posting on his Instagram?

Extremely. It is a true partnership and he is so easygoing, honest and open. We collaborate on captions, he approves every piece of content before it is posted and he crafts his Stories himself. His favorite platform is Instagram, where he feels like he can connect with fans in the most authentic and immediate way.

“When it comes to strategy, the most important thing you can do as an athlete is to have a team around you,” says Charles. “One that knows you well, with whom you can be at ease, that shares the same vision and with whom you can be yourself. From the moment you have that, the content will feel genuine and be loved by your fans. This, connecting with the fans, is really my main priority.”

What does the programming schedule look like?

We’ve really broken the mold in terms of what an athlete in this field shares on race weekends, both in terms of the timing, the consistency and how intimate it is to showcase everything from his perspective.

In-season, we follow a rough outline around every race: a photo from a practice session, Charles then shares his feelings in Stories as the weekend unfolds and on Sunday nights, if a race has gone well, we post a reel recapping the weekend. We’ve also experimented with posting reels pre-race, which give his fans behind-the-scenes access coupled with excitement for the race ahead.

Off-season we showcase more of his personal life, who he is and what he enjoys.

In so far as banking content, Charles knows his fans expect him to bring them into the fold and he wants to give them that. They can also spot the most minute details in every image and they let us know what they notice, so there’s really no repurposing old content. It’s all fresh, exciting, innovative and in the moment.

How have you managed to retain high engagement while growing so rapidly?

For the first 24 hours after we post anything, we monitor the comments. Charles reads his own comments, even if he doesn’t respond. It’s through the comments that we identify white spaces of opportunity, where we understand what fans want to see from him.

Then once a month, we do a deep dive. We look together at the top and bottom performing posts across formats (reels, static imagery, carousels) and discuss why we think certain things resonate, what are people saving, sharing, remixing and what we can learn from it.

What has reels as a creative tool enabled you to do that feels fresh and exciting?

We’re big fans of audio, subtitles and trends.

Subtitles have opened up Charles’s content to a wider audience, it’s a matter of accessibility. When we see fans commenting to thank us, someone once wrote in to say he is deaf and can now feel like he is part of this community, it’s important.

With trends, it’s about striking a balance between hopping on viral moments but not the kind that will feel stale a few days later. Transitions help with that. When we identify a transition that we like and that we see people responding well to, we can utilize it in a variety of environments.

Trending music is also key. When a reel takes off, we hone in on the genre of music that accompanied it. We also make sure to source local audio depending on where in the world Charles is racing.

What advice do you have for athletes who'd like to leverage Reels to grow a loyal community?

Don’t worry about how many followers you have–care about how engaging you are. When you show true connection and take into consideration fan feedback, they’re going to notice and continue to follow and engage. Genuinely care about the content that you’re putting out, make sure it’s something your fans are looking for.

Think of Instagram as your stage, a place for you to launch a first look or an exclusive behind-the-scenes moment that keeps fans on their toes.

Creating a good consistent cadence helps. Charles’s fans, for instance, got used to seeing race recaps every Sunday night.

What’s next for Charles on Instagram?

He’s looking to keep pushing boundaries, share more personal content that he feels comfortable with while maintaining the modern, sleek, polished look he’s known for.

Crucially, with three US races this year, it is the best time yet to grow his audience further in the US. Keep an eye out for even more collaborations!