6 Things to Keep in Mind While Marketing on Instagram

Instagram was first rolled out in the year 2010. At first, it was designed for photo sharing only. Video posts came in much later, in the year 2013. Instagram is the first of its kind to have in app editing and filter options. It was first developed in iOS phones (2010) and then in android phones (2013). In 2013, more than 1million app downloads was done in one single day.

A huge number of users are making use of this platform every single day. According to Instagram statistics, over 500 million users use Instagram every day.

When it comes to businesses working on Instagram the statistics are impressive. 200 million users visit at least one business profile daily. Therefore proper channelization of businesses via Instagram tools, today, has become very essential. The ad revenue generation through Instagram, as of this year, is predicted to grow above 4.5million.

The question is, after acknowledging those figures in mind, who wouldn’t want to market their business through this platform. And if you are a business, you must be aware of the following six things that will help you in marketing your business productively.

1. You Cannot Ignore Videos over?Photos

Photos are essential, needless to say. They represent what a brand is about. Like logos do. They provide you, as a consumer, a first-hand information about the brand. The onset of videos came in on June 2013. Videos helped to create messages that are compelling and creative. Unlike, photos, they have the power to deliver more data in a short time span. Since its advent the hustle bustle around video posts kept growing. People started to make more and more videos to bring the attention of viewers to their accounts.

Instagram videos get over 2times more engagement rate than photos. Videos will help businesses to bring in more purchases with a higher engagement ratio. People will like to spend a little more of their time if the first few seconds of the video is captivating. That way businesses will be able to hold a viewer’s attention more. Messages through short videos are easily sent and also is visually appealing. More recently created, IGTV in Instagram is a video feature that helps you to create long videos with no time limit. Therefore as a business, it is important that you bring in more video posts in your feed.

2. You Need to Approach Influential Accounts on Instagram

Globally, influencer marketing in Instagram is to reach the mark of $10million to $15 million by 2022.

Influencers are people who have made themselves a huge follower’s base and growing through their unique work. Influencers have already build themselves followers over a long time period. The relationship between an influencer and their followers is on based on friendlier interactions, trust and credibility. When they post a picture or story about your business, it is likely that your follower base will increase. Marketers can make up to $5.20 for every $1 invested in marketing by influencers. Shout outs of your business post on their profiles will help your business to gain potential customers. It is essential for any business to grow their network through already established brands and services. They will help new businesses to expand marketing through a trustworthy group of followers.

3. Keep Your Story Highlights Updated

These short lived 24hours stories accounts for a positive growth in business profile analytics, when done rightly. Instagram is being used constantly. People log in and log out of Instagram quiet frequently. There are millions of users always actively posting on Instagram. Old posts can often tend to scroll away with other new posts on a user’s feed. Many a times, we hardly scroll through a long list of posts in our feeds. Which is why there is a slight chance of your content getting lost midway. The user might not even come across your content, forget about engaging with it.

Here comes the role of stories. They help you to keep your audience updated about your services. Stories are the first feature that appears when you open the app. About 62% of people have shown interest in brands through their stories. The chances of clicking thorough a story is higher than having to scroll through unlimited number of posts. Almost half of businesses active on Instagram create at least one story every month. You can post as many stories as you want and engage your audience with polls, giveaways, service demonstrations, question answer cues and many other options. You can also personalize your stories for a particular group in your followers so that only they can see it.

4. You Cannot Do Away with?Hashtags

Popular words that are used in huge numbers as a part of contents posted in Instagram are termed as hashtags. Before you market your brand, you must be aware of the popular hashtags in use in Instagram. When you post contents using popular hashtags, it is more likely to be discovered by Instagram users. It is also vital that you keep a track of the hashtags that your followers use. Using them in your contents will make your posts also discoverable by your follower’s followers. It enhances the reach that you have established on Instagram.

Instagram allows businesses to create branded hashtags that will help users to identify with your brand. Branded hashtags will help to organize your posts under one heading. This way you can see similar posts under similar hashtags and keep a track on their performance. A post with one Instagram hashtag has an average of 12.6% more engagement than those without it. Hashtags help you to get more traffic in your posts.

5. Make Your Followers a Part of Your?Post

Instagram offers a range of tools and techniques to help you interact with your audience. Feed posts have comments section for users to give you feedback on your posts. Stories can be used by taking polls and asking questions for better interaction between you and your followers. Instagram is a social interactive platform where you can directly approach your audience. Such interactions facilitates the audience to understand your brand in a better way. If they like a certain post they can also save it and share it with their followers and friends.

Instagram promotions and giveaways will help any business to generate higher traffic flow in their accounts as more and more users can participate in these contents. Sales pitch through informal interactions boosts the number of different actions taken by followers in your account.

6. Go Overboard with?Posts

Instagram offers a range of choices through which you can market your contents. Be it stories, direct messages, video posts, IGTVs and so much more. It is lucrative and easy, to post as much content as you would want. But going overboard with your posts can result in a negative setback to your business. Nobody wants to see too much of anything at one go. Hence, you need to plan your posts accordingly.

Too many posts in one go is not productive. Strategize the quantity of posts in one day, scheduling posts according to the time of the day, is important. You must incorporate Instagram tools effectively in managing your posts. Making your stories very tempting that your followers are bound to access your account to see the contents. Posting videos and photos time by time to sustain the audience’s engagement is very essential. With too many posts in your follower’s feed, in one go, will make them less interested to read through the contents, therefore, you must make efficient time management while you are marketing in this platform.

Conclusion

Instagram offers you, as a business, a wide variety of options to help your brand grow. You must chalk out what best suits you and how to use them. Not every business is same. What might work for one might not do for the other! You need to be aware of what your objectives are and what your followers want to see. You must keep in mind, strictly, what your followers are interested in and how they want to be engaged. The more you communicate with your audience the more your business intends to grow. The platform is constantly changing and updating itself to every new norm and technique. As a business, you must keep looking forward and update yourself with these so that businesses’ productivity increases.

Originally published at https://www.namasteui.com on August 11, 2020.