Last updated on January 10th, 2023
#love, #instagood, #photooftheday
The three most popular hashtags on Instagram reveal little about the state of business on Facebook’s hottest social channel and one of the most visited photo-based platforms on the internet. But they do tell us a lot about what Instagram users like to see. You need to create an Instagram marketing plan that is unique and specific to your business model.
Exciting, Professional-Looking Content
If you’re not using Instagram to edit and share your own inspiring stories, you’re missing out. You can also create inspiring stories for Instagram with the help of free Instagram story templates available online. There are currently 800 million monthly active users on this network.
That’s 800 million opportunities for your business to expand its reach through Instagram marketing. If you’re not willing to chase them, others will. A whopping 70% of Instagram hashtags are already brand-specific.
You can either join the race or pass the torch to your competitors.
Fortunately for you, you don’t need a headstart if you have a smart Instagram marketing strategy, which can be created with ease, using these intelligent instagram marketing tips that we have listed for you.
The Following Tips Will Help You With Everything You Need To Become A Leading Insta Brand
01. Build A Strong Following In Three Easy Steps
Having high-quality Instagram content and no audience to appreciate it is a waste of your time and resources. So, before you start posting anything, let’s work on your Instagram marketing and hence, your follower generation plan.
There should be three tasks on your to-do list:
i. Promote your Insta account on other channels.
ii. Give people a good reason to follow you.
iii. “Steal” followers from your niche competitors.
Instagram was acquired by Facebook back in 2012, so don’t forget to sync your accounts. Once you start following all your Facebook friends on Insta, it’ll be easy for them to follow you back.
But what about your customers that are not on Facebook? Contact them by email and give them a sneak peek of your offer on Instagram.
As for other potential customers, who you still haven’t befriended on any social media, the easiest way is to find a competitor brand or influencer with a lot of followers you can contact and “steal”.
02. Establish A Posting Schedule And Stick To It
Leading Insta brands post content 1.5 times every day. Anything less won’t work, but neither will anything more.
The worst thing you can do as a business that’s taking its marketing strategies to Instagram is to be too pushy about it. To avoid annoying your followers, post one image, and a few stories daily as a part of your Instagram marketing schedule. So, while you can easily make videos using an Instagram video maker, make sure that you stick to the schedule of posting only one good video a day.
And do that during business hours. This is when 90% of employees use social media to procrastinate on duty.
03. Use The Pareto Principle To Your Advantage
Applicable to just about anything in business and life, the so-called Pareto principle refers to one simple rule of distribution. In the context of marketing, the rule is 80% value, 20% promotion.
Never be too promotional on Instagram. This will only annoy your existing and potential customers and make them unfollow you.
In between these rare self-promotional posts, you can mix up your content by sharing niche-related motivational quotes, taking a stance on important social issues, or simply by being funny.
Want to create attractive posts? Hire a freelance graphic designer.
04. Use Instagram Live Streaming For Promotion
Unlike everyday posts, Instagram Live Streaming is a very acceptable way of sharing promotional news with your followers. Use it to unbox new products, give an office tour, or host a Q&A.
Marketing experts recognize this as an opportunity to humanize their brand. You can use it in your own unique way.
Whatever you choose to stream, don’t forget to invite your followers early on. Otherwise, they might miss it. Also, you’ll want to respond to their comments to boost the engagement rates.
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05. Use Insta Stories To Create A Sense Of Urgency
Who doesn’t like watching Insta Stories?
Everyone’s favorite leisure activity is also a brilliant way to drive more traffic to your website and increase your online conversions. And all that thanks to one of the coolest social features:
The disappearing act.
Say you’re running a contest or promoting a limited edition of your classic product. Instagram Stories allow you to create a buzz and turn your campaign into a branded VIP-only online event.
The same goes for discounts your followers especially love those.
Instagram stories create a certain sense of urgency, which can be used to highlight how exclusive your products and special offers are. As such, they are a powerful tool. Use them wisely.
You can also link your stories to your Instgram post sto bring more engagement. For this, you can try various Instagram post templates to link your stories with the post and give your account a creative look.
06. Use Instagram Quizzes To Generate Hot Leads
There’s a new feature on Instagram called the Story Quiz. As simple as it is – it allows you to add a tiny quiz sticker to your story – this addition to what’s already an extremely useful Instagram marketing service tool hides an immense potential of its own.
Generally speaking, online quizzes are potent lead generation machines. So much so, in fact, that lead generation quizzes boast a capture rate of 33.6%!
Plus, an average quiz gets shared around 1,900 times on social media.
Now, an Insta Quiz sticker is not much. It basically lets you pre-choose the correct answer and show it to the casual quiz taker. From a marketing perspective, this is a neat engagement trick.
But if you want to use your Instagram marketing strategy to capture leads with quizzes, then you need a different approach. Most importantly, you need an online quiz maker.
And can you guess which quiz type is the most popular one? That’s right – personality quizzes.
By investing in a basic personality quiz maker and assessment software, you can diversify your Instagram marketing strategy with a new type of engaging content that everyone loves.
07. Start Collaborating With Instagram Influencers
Tom Fishburne said, “The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.” As a founder of Marketoonist and a niche influencer, he must know what he’s talking about, right?
There are two things we want you to consider here:
i. Today’s audiences simply don’t respond to traditional marketing, and We’d rather put our trust in social media influencers than in brands.
ii. Around 82% of people feel comfortable making purchasing decisions based on recommendations from niche influencers such as Tom Fishburne. 94% believe in their judgment.
Why is that, exactly?
It’s simple, really – we don’t like being sold to. This is especially true in the context of social media marketing, which is why having an Instagram influencer recommending your brand’s products and services is always a good idea.
As a pro tip, we’ll tell you this – stick to influencers with between 10k and 50k followers.
Since influencer marketing is all about authenticity, people tend to trust micro-influencers more. The way your customers see it, these people still haven’t compromised with their integrity.
08. Use Hashtags When Writing Instagram Captions
Instagram users don’t only follow other Instagram users; they also follow hashtags. Using popular hashtags related to your niche will definitely put your brand name on the map.
Avoid the most commonly used ones, though. Being used by everyone, these hashtags can hardly help you stand out.
You should also share your posts with your own, brand-specific hashtag. Much like logo design, the creation of your branded hashtag is crucial for your online presence and recognition.
09. Encourage Satisfied Customers To Post UGC
User-generated content (UGC) provides a good alternative to influencer marketing.
One major difference between these techniques is that UGC doesn’t cost money, while Instagram influencers usually demand to be compensated for their recommendation services.
Be it as it may, UGC achieves a very similar effect.
Instead of traditional in-your-face marketing, it implies something similar to word-of-mouth- an opportunity for brands to lie back while satisfied customers promote their products.
The only problem is – customers sometimes need an incentive for sharing UGS.
Here’s how to encourage them:
i. Give them something to post about – a creative hook such as teasers and freebies.
ii. Run contests and quizzes that they can take part in and share with your hashtag.
iii. Create a cleverly branded hashtag that sounds cool and is easy to memorize.
iv. Find a professional UGC agency that will come up with engaging activities and offer proven strategies that work for your particular business niche.
10. Target New Customers Using Instagram Ads
Instagram marketing campaigns cost little to none. But if you do want to invest a bit more than your time and creativity, you can start running targeted ads. This is certainly a much welcome addition to every Instagram-based strategy.
Like on Facebook, Instagram Ads can be targeted based on age, gender, location, and other factors that helps define your target audience and your ideal buyer persona on Instagram. And they even look sleek – the same as regular posts, only with a CTA button.
11. Start Using The Instagram Swipe Up Feature
The new Instagram Swipe Up feature allows you to drive hot leads to your website not the long way around via your Instagram account, but directly from your trending Insta Story. You’ll have to reach 10K followers to unlock it, though, so pick up the pace!
12. Use Shoppable Posts To Convert Leads In-App
Similar to the Swipe Up feature, Shoppable Posts enable online store owners, as well as other entrepreneurs who sell their products on the internet, to convert leads directly on Insta.
Shoppable tags can be added to any post and include everything a customer needs to know about a certain product – its name, price, and a link that leads directly to the checkout.
Convenient, right?
13. Promote The Same Product Several Times
More than 60% of social media users don’t make a purchase until they’ve seen the same product on their feed at least twice, which means you’ll need to post it more than once. Don’t use the copy-paste version, though.
This is a great opportunity to show your creative side and demonstrate the many ways and contexts in which your products can be used and enjoyed.
Promoting same products at multiple times require different formats. Get some graphic design ideas from Designhill – World’s No.1 freelance graphic design platform.
14. Always Respond To Comments And Messages
“Marketing is no longer about the stuff that you make, but about the stories, you tell.” This quotable statement by the bestselling author, blogger, and another great influencer Seth Godin rings very true in the context of social media marketing, particularly Instagram. But it’s not only about the stories you tell.
Never confuse social media for a marketing platform. These networks have their own unwritten rules of conduct that forbid advertising from taking up too much of their users’ time. After all, the foundation of social networking is communication.
Think about your Instagram campaigns as a two-way street and do everything in your power to humanize your brand by actually socializing with your loyal followers. There are too many of them, so use a social listening tool.
Conclusion
Building an effective Instagram marketing strategy takes time. It may take you a couple of months to hit the first major milestone in your plan, but don’t lose your patience. The moment you stand down, your competition will swallow you.
Until then, make these tips your professional mantra and make the most of the features that Insta offers to brands. Study what everyone’s doing, but create your own approach.
Good luck, and see you on Instagram!
