Brands are always on the lookout for new ways to connect to their target audience easily and more effectively. Traditional methods are slowly being phased out by brands in favor of digital marketing.
Social media marketing has helped businesses from all niches gain traction for less marketing dollars spent, compared to some other marketing channels. One of the platforms that has seen a meteoric rise and offers consistent growth for business applications is Instagram. Instagram has a billion people logging in every month, which means it has enormous potential for any brand to find and connect to their audience.
Instagram For Business – What The Numbers Tell Us
Instagram has established its social media dominance for business over the years. Let’s take a look at a few incredible statistics that can further illustrate how effective Instagram can be for brands looking to expand their customer base.
- 90% of the top 100 brands have an Instagram account
- 80% of accounts follow a brand
- 1 out of every 3 most viewed Story posts are by brands
- 50% of all brands post one Story every month
- 2 million monthly advertisers
All these numbers are proof of how powerful Instagram is as a business platform. If you are a brand owner, these figures should definitely make Instagram a much more appealing platform.
Using Instagram To Grow Your Business
Instagram is definitely one of the best social media platforms for brands to invest on in the future. Instagram has been touted as the fastest growing social network for business by many authority websites. Here are several strategies that are aimed at getting the most out of your Instagram business account:
1. Engagement With Your Audience
Engagement numbers are vital for improving your business. The long term goal of your brand’s social media account should be to draw in engagement rather than just followers. A brand needs to make sure that they interact with their audience for optimal engagement. Respond to their comments, include persuasive CTAs like “Click on,” “Subscribe to,” “register now” to get their attention.
2. Tell Your Brand “Story”
Instagram is a high engagement platform, but when they introduced Stories, the overall engagement grew even more. Instagram Stories are short video clips that only have a lifespan of 24 hours. Although first brought in by Snapchat, Instagram Stories found tremendous success with brands and users alike. Brands have been using Stories creatively to leverage customer interaction and sometimes even going viral.
3. Analyze Everything
When you are using Instagram for business, make sure that you record accurate metrics on everything to do with your brand in order to track your progress over time. There are several Instagram reporting tools that you can use to get the most out of your Instagram account and find what works best for your brand. We especially suggest tracking your followers and the referral traffic driven to your website from Instagram.
4. Craft a Strong Instagram Bio
An Instagram bio is where you need to get creative and let your audience know what your brand is about. You can showcase your brand’s personality here but remember not to go overboard with it. The key is to be faithful to your brand voice. You can include a URL here, so make sure you do. If it is too long, we suggest you use a URL shortener to make your bio seem more compact. A good Instagram bio is the ultimate CTA, so make sure you make it as attractive and clickable as possible.
5. Get Influencers
Influencer endorsements are one of the most powerful ways of growing a brand’s Instagram account. Influencers are people who have a lot of social media leverage with considerable follower numbers and engagement. However, it’s crucial to choose the right kind of influencer for your brand. Celebrity influencers might have a huge number of followers, but it is also important that they tie in with your brand. Micro/nano influencers might have lower follower numbers but often offer higher engagement rates and can be more specific to your brand niche.
6. Instagram Works Better With Others
Instagram is a social media platform that works and plays well with other platforms like Facebook and Twitter. In fact, if you’re able to connect them to your Instagram account, you’ll reach more people than just focusing on just the one platform. You have the option of posting automatically to your Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr, to name a few so you can funnel in followers from those channels as well.
7. Follow a Posting Schedule
Another thing you need to focus on is to create and follow a consistent posting schedule. Find what topics and times work for your audience and make sure you stick to it. You don’t have to overwhelm your Instagram feed with posts, but don’t neglect to post for too long either. The key is to find the right balance between the two.
8. Get Your Audience Involved
One method to get content for your feed, as well as increasing your engagement, is to feature your audience images as well. For example, if you sell products, encourage your followers to upload pictures of themselves using your products by featuring them on your Instagram feed. You could also turn it into a contest which would attract even more users to your Instagram feed. User-generated content (UGC), when done right, offers benefits for the brand through increased engagement and reputation.
9. Quality Over Quantity
Be sure to always prioritize quality content, and never post just because you need to keep up with your posting schedule. Another mistake is to cram your posts with too many hashtags. While you can use up to 30 hashtags on a post, don’t feel the need to add that many. Only include a few, relevant hashtags when applicable, don’t force it! These mistakes can get posts classified as spam and “shadow-banned,” which means no one will be able to see them.
10. Consider Paid Options
While Instagram is an excellent organic advertising platform for business, there are powerful targeting tools when you opt for paid advertising on the platform. One such example is the ability to specifically target the age range of your audience to make sure your advertisements are better targeted. This can ensure that the content you create for that particular demographic has more chances of producing results.
While using Instagram can be a useful facet of your digital marketing strategy, it is definitely not something that can produce overnight results. However, as a platform, Instagram offers you a very powerful foundation from which you can reach out to your customers and other brands alike.
