How I Grew My Pet Accounts to ~70k — My Step-by-Step System
The whole climb, stage by stage: how I started, found my angle, and grew ~12k on Instagram, ~15k on TikTok, and ~43k on YouTube 🐾
Hi — it’s Iana, the human behind Nicole & Nora, my two miniature dachshunds and the entire reason my phone storage is permanently full. People ask me the same question more than any other: “How did you actually grow to ~70k? Like, what did you do — in order?”
So today I’m writing the post I wish someone had handed me on day one. Not vague “post consistently and engage!” advice — the actual sequence. The stages I went through, what I posted in each one, the things that worked, the things that flopped loudly, and exactly how you’d copy each step for your own account. This is the flagship one. Save it. 🐾
New here? Come meet the girls where it all actually happens — we're on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. 🐾
Real talk: the numbers below show what's possible, not what's promised. They're an example of the upside this can create — yours might be higher, lower, or slower, and none of it is financial advice or a guarantee. My audience, though, is 100% real: ~12k Instagram, ~15k TikTok, ~43k YouTube, ~70k all in, built over roughly a year. And anything paid, gifted, or affiliate always carries a clear #ad / #sponsored label up top — that's the FTC rule, and I follow it. 🐾
First, the honest truth about the curve
Everyone wants the growth to look like a rocket. Mine looked like a dachshund climbing stairs — slow, a little dramatic, then suddenly faster than you expect. The total is real; the shape below is illustrative, but it’s emotionally accurate:
The part nobody likes to hear: the first stretch is boring on purpose. The accounts that make it aren’t the ones that went viral on day three — they’re the ones that survived the flat part long enough to reach the snowball. I almost quit twice in the flat part. I’m so glad I didn’t.
The shape of the whole system: five stages
Here’s the thing I figured out way too late: you’re not trying to “grow an account.” You’re trying to climb five very different stages, and each one needs a different kind of posting. What grows you at Stage 1 will quietly stall you at Stage 3. I think most people get stuck because they keep doing Stage 1 things forever and wonder why the ladder isn’t moving.
The five stages, top-line:
Stage 1 — Start small: pick one clear angle and just begin.
Stage 2 — Post daily: find out what actually sticks.
Stage 3 — Double down: repeat your winners, kill your darlings.
Stage 4 — Go multi-platform: one shoot, three platforms.
Stage 5 — Scale & earn: series, collabs, and turning attention into income.
That’s the map. The free version gives you the what and the why of each stage. The paid version below is the real thing — what I posted at each stage, the flops, the tools, the illustrative money math, and exactly what I’d do if I were starting again today with zero followers.
Stage 4 leans hard on a system I’ve already shared — if you want the engine that makes one filming session feed every platform, I broke the whole thing down in my post on our faceless content workflow. It pairs perfectly with this one. 🐾
🐾 Helping animals is the whole reason we're here. If you'd like to help too, you can chip in to our shelter fundraiser for Animal Haven — every little bit helps a dog in need. Join us.🩷
The payoff: the whole climb, stage by stage
Okay — here’s everything. Read it once top to bottom, then come back and work the stage you’re actually in. Here’s the ladder we’re climbing:
First — how long this actually took
Before the stages, the question I get more than any other: how long did this take? So here’s the honest answer: about a year — roughly twelve months from zero to ~70k, no rounded-up fairy tale. The four milestones below are the ones that matter for every account; I’ve marked roughly how long each leg took me so you can gut-check your own pace against a real one. Your timing will differ, but the shape almost never does.
0 → 1,000 — “the quiet start” (the slowest leg by far). This was the longest-feeling leg by far, even though the number is small. Almost nobody was watching, and that’s exactly the filter — most people quit right here. What moved the needle wasn’t reach, it was finally narrowing my angle so the few people who found me had a reason to stay.
1,000 → 10,000 — “the grind” (steady and compounding). This is where posting daily and watching my data paid off: two or three formats started consistently out-saving everything else, and repeating them (instead of chasing new ideas) is what finally bent the curve upward. Steady, unglamorous, compounding.
10,000 → ~70,000 — “the snowball” (the fastest stretch). The fastest leg — and the surprise is where it came from: YouTube, now ~43k of my total, which I nearly ignored. Going multi-platform with the same footage is what turned a single audience into three that fed each other.
The pattern I’d tattoo on every beginner: the first leg is slow on purpose, and the later legs are faster than you’d ever believe from inside the flat part. The people who make it aren’t faster climbers — they just don’t quit during “the quiet start.”
Stage 1 — Start small (pick ONE angle)
What it is: the deceptively simple act of choosing a single, clear angle and posting your first things. Why it matters: a confused page can’t grow. When I started, my page was “cute dog, generally” — which is the same as everyone else’s. Nothing happened for weeks, and honestly it deserved nothing.
The flop: my early posts were random — a sunset here, a half-blurry zoomie there, captions like “happy Monday!” There was no reason to follow. The fix that worked: I narrowed to one specific thing — two miniature dachshunds and the very particular comedy of their loaf-shaped daily life. Specific beats broad every single time. “Mini dachshund chaos” is a follow; “dog content” is a scroll.
What I’d actually do today: finish this sentence before you post anything — “My page is about ___, for people who ___.” Then post your intro: a “meet the girls” reel, your name reveal, and three posts that prove the angle. Keep a one-page brand note (name, voice, three content pillars) in Canva so every post stays on-angle. (Results vary — but clarity compounds.)
Stage 2 — Post daily (find what sticks)
What it is: a deliberately high-volume stretch where the goal isn’t growth — it’s data. Why it matters: you do not actually know what your audience wants yet. You think you do. You’re usually wrong (I was). The only way to find your winners is to put a lot of different shots on the table and watch which ones people save and share.
The honest catch: this stage is tiring, and the numbers stay flat for a while. That’s normal — you’re in the boring part of the curve. Watch saves and shares, not likes. Likes are a pat on the head; saves and shares are the algorithm’s love language and the truest signal of what’s working. What I’d actually do: post once a day for ~30 days, vary the format on purpose (funny clip, calm aesthetic, relatable POV, tiny tutorial), and keep a simple note of which three posts outperformed. Don’t batch-burn yourself out — a sustainable cadence you can keep beats a heroic week followed by silence.
That’s the first half of the climb — the two stages almost nobody gets right, and the timeline nobody shows you. Stages 3, 4 and 5 are where it stops being effort and starts being a system.
Inside the paid half, you’ll get:
🥇 Stages 3–5 in full — double down, go multi-platform, and scale to income
💸 the honest money math (illustrative), and what each stage realistically pays
🔁 the one boring habit underneath all five stages — the thing that actually did the work
🌭 plus 30% off the $29 Petfluencer Playbook, paid subscribers only
📚 and every paid post + the full archive
Come join me on the inside 👇
