The Fundamentals of Using Instagram For Business
Instagram has over 800 million monthly active users, less competition and a more engaged audience than other social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter.
This presents businesses and entrepreneurs with an opportunity to market their products to a more targeted and interested audience without spending an enormous amount of money on paid advertising. Whether your strategy is on point or you’re a newcomer to marketing with Instagram, you’ll find these 5 tips on how to use Instagram for your business super useful.
1. Show What You Do in a Creative Way
Focus on the solution you provide, not the products you sell. On Instagram, it’s essential to add value to your customers and look pretty while you do it. Share social proof like screenshots of happy customer messages or clients using your services to showcase what you do. Never underestimate the fact that your most important asset (and downfall) on this social media network is visual content. We all know what looks good and what doesn’t so post content that reflects your brand correctly.
If your business is service-oriented, focus on showcasing the process behind providing the service. Share the journey with your audience; everyone loves a good story. Be sure to share some actionable advice and how-tos to build value and rapport with your audience. Don’t be afraid to invest in a photo/videographer to get professional shots of your work. High quality clients will resonate with high quality photos.
2. Create an Optimized Profile
Your profile is the foundation to any solid Instagram page. Don’t underestimate the importance of a bio because an optimized bio will have you ranking higher in searches, seen more often and positioned as an authority. A clear bio will help users decide if your page is right for them or not.
As an entrepreneur, you probably do a whole lot of things and offer even more solutions. Don’t get too caught up in fitting all of that in 150 characters. Focus on your most relevant offer or your next big thing – be it an event, promotion or product launch.
The only clickable link is located at the bottom of your Bio section, be sure to make a habit of updating it frequently. Brands that only use the bio as a link to their homepage are missing out, big time. You gotta think bigger about where to send traffic. If your content marketing is strong enough, your traffic will be free. Think about driving event registrations, building your list with a lead magnet or even taking users to an online shop or straight to an application to work with you.
Once you’ve switched your account to a business profile you’ll have the option to add a phone number to your bio and get access to extensive analytics data that wouldn’t otherwise be available unless you’re using a social media tool. So think about it, does your bio represent your brand well?
3. Expand Your Reach with #Hashtags
Use hashtags to expand your reach. Using hashtags is like optimizing SEO for Instagram. These can be campaign specific or general – all that’s important is that they are relevant to your audience and the market. Make sure to also set up your main company hashtag (#yourbrandname), and use it sparingly across Instagram (Twitter is good too). This makes it easier for people to find content related to you as well as your main account.
It’s best practice to use between three to five hashtags, despite the fact that the maximum hashtag you can add is 30 per Instagram post. When you use just a handful hashtags it allows you to position and describe the content in a unique way. You can always post the remainder of your hashtags in the first comment to maximize your chance of being found due to a particular hashtag search. For more tips on using your Instagram properly for business make sure you download my FREE GUIDE To Instagram Success!
4. Analyze Success & Double Down
Without taking a step back and analyzing what worked and didn’t, marketing becomes a guessing game. The truth is, you can read all the articles in the world about the best practices and publishing times, but you will only find out what works for you through actually executing your strategy and testing the results. Find out what your audience likes and double down on it.
Social media management tools can help, though. You can use them not only to schedule your Instagram campaigns in advance but also use social media analytics to measure their success. Make sure to regularly measure your follower count, engagement and clicks, all to refine and improve your strategy.
5. Be Consistent!
Consistency and success go hand in hand in all aspects of business. Staying relevant to your audience requires you to share valuable content on a consistent basis. Once you get in a routine of posting regularly your audience will begin to expect you to post. Be an authority and consistently share your opinions, values & work. Commit to posting regularly, whether it be 2x a day, daily or every other day.
Planning your posts in advance will help you stay consistent with posting. Set aside time in your weekly schedule to create all of the content that will be posted throughout the week. You can use a web app like Hoot Suite or Buffer to schedule your posts in advance.
If you’ve found this blog useful then, then make sure you get my Free Instagram Growth Guide that will teach you how to take your instagram to the next level. CLICK HERE to get yours now!
