Instagram is one of the leading social media platforms launched in the year 2010. In the beginning, it was a regular application to share images and videos with the average users of only 1 million people. The frequent updates and new features on Instagram help business people to promote their brand.
At present, the followers on Instagram reach out to more than 1 billion active users monthly. The tremendous growth within a short period of 10 years brings business people on Instagram to make their brand popular among the people.
Instagram plays a very important role in marketing, bringing out drastic reach for your brand among your competitors. As per the survey, 90 percent of Instagram users follow at least one business account. It helps to increase your followers for your brand in the business.
Here is the complete guide explained below about the importance of Instagram marketing to grow your business.
1. Create a Professional account
Open an Instagram account in the application with the help of an Email address or your phone number. Utilize the additional features of Instagram by converting to a business account.
In the Settings option, choose a Professional account to convert to a business account. If needed, you can also link with your Facebook account.
Add the bio about your business with attractive content, including your business location, address, and contact details with your website URL, which will be an easy way for your users to find you. Provide a unique and identifiable user name with the profile image that tells about your brand.
The above information provides trust among the people for your brand and keeps you engaged with your audience by increasing the followers.
2. How to keep yourself active on Instagram
Instagram is an active platform where users spend an average of 30 minutes per day on Instagram. So keep your business profile always active to ensure your users recognize your product or brand easily.
Publish a consistent post regularly
If you want to grow your business, the important marketing strategy on Instagram is to engage your audience. Post content on your Instagram feed with a consistent look, creating interest in your brand on a regular basis, indicating to your followers that you are active.
Use Instagram stories
Instagram introduces a new feature called Instagram stories, a new way to post your content. It brought a massive change among the users, which appears only for 24 hours. Your followers can directly respond to your stories available at the top of your follower’s homepage, keeping your audience engaged with your brand.
3. Target your audience
A simple tactic to reach out higher in your business is to target your audience. Keep on researching the people interested in your product and start targeting their location. Use Instagram ads to target the users in a particular area.
The three types of Ads that can perform on Instagram are Photo ads, Video ads, and Carousel ads.
Photo ad
Photo ad displays your content in image format with a sponsored option indicated at the top of the post.
Video ad
Video ad displays your content in video format for a period of 60 seconds with the sponsored option.
Carousel ad
Carousel ad is the same as the Photo ad displaying your content in image format but with multiple images in a slideshow format.
4. Post a long video
Instagram usually displays a video for a length of 60 seconds which gives only a short description. In order to shoot a long video, Instagram introduces IGTV (Instagram TV) in 2016, a long-form video describing in detail your content.
IGTV videos provide mobile viewing formats, both in vertical and horizontal view. Get more IGTV video views by creating exciting video content about your brand. It helps to boost your performance and increases brand awareness among the followers.
The average length of IGTV video is 15 minutes for a regular user. If you are a verified user, you can post a video for an hour (60 minutes). If you are a verified user, Instagram provides a tick mark near your user name.
5. Streaming Live videos
If any interesting information happens in your business, start a live video with your followers to make them interact with your directly. While streaming a live video, you have to concentrate on background infrastructure with good content.
Give answers for the comments of your followers in live. Show your new products with live demos to your followers, which creates your brand trust.
The live video displays in the first of your follower’s stories which tends your followers to view. It helps to increase your brand awareness and reach new audiences.
6. Importance of Hashtags
The most important way to find the content of other users is by using the hashtag. Use a relevant hashtag related to your business to improve your visibility. Instagram allows a maximum of 30 hashtags. But using fewer hashtags provides a higher response.
Instagram gives an option to view the number of posts using the same hashtag by typing the hashtag in the search box.
If a higher number of posts has the same hashtag, choose that particular hashtag to use in your content to increase your visibility and increase your brand engagement.
7. Analyze correct posting time
The main objective of posting content on Instagram is to engage your followers with your brand. So if your post reaches your audience at the right time, your followers will register your brand easily. Before posting content, start analyzing the right time with the inbuilt feature called Instagram Insights.
Instagram Insights helps to monitor the active performance of your audience. It gives the data for every post regarding your follower’s action on your particular content. It automatically calculates the average time of your active users. It helps to predict the days which have higher traffic in a week.
Scheduling posts on weekend days will perform well compared to normal days. So plan to publish the important content on weekend days. The approximate right time to post is 11 AM to 1 PM in the morning and 7 PM to 9 PM in the evening.
8. Provide contests
The easiest method to grab your follower’s attention is by conducting a contest on your Instagram page. Run a contest in a creative way to promote your brand and keep your audience engaged.
You can use countdown stickers in your stories before starting to create excitement among your followers. Set a time and keep on increasing the curiosity among your followers to increase brand engagement.
Give a contest to tag their friends in the comments, which creates a way to increase new audiences. Once the contest finishes, post the winner in your Instagram feed by tagging them and give the award related to your product to increase brand awareness.
Conclusion
From the above points, you have come to know that how Instagram helps the markets to grow their business. Keep your audience engaged with your profile to increase the number of followers. Provide immediate response to your followers, creating brand trust. Use your innovations to create a separate path and stay unique to your followers. Develop your marketing techniques to reach drastic growth in your business.
Author Bio:
Caterina Taylor is an experienced social media marketer and writer who works at PlanYourGram.com. She loves to work on content creation for social media blogs and has the potential to deliver engaging content on various platforms and networks.
