What is Instagram Marketing and Why
Should You Care?
When devising your internet marketing strategy, it can be all too easy to forget about
Instagram in the mix. Compared with Facebook, Instagram has relatively few users and
it’s not as clear how it can be monetized. There’s no content in an image and people
don’t want pictures in their Instagram feed telling them to ‘buy now’ or sign up to their
mailing list…
So with all that in mind, why would you invest a lot of time or money into the platform?
Well actually there are a lot of good reasons. When used correctly, Instagram is a
fantastic way to promote products and services, to increase your brand’s visibility and to
position yourself as a hip and artistic organization. We’ll get into the details and the
statistics later on but the bottom line is that you’ll probably be surprised. Instagram is
bigger than Twitter and its users are far more engaged and far happier to buy products
– even when compared with Facebook itself!
Let’s take a look then at what Instagram actually is and why it matters in a big way for
your business…
There’s a good chance you already know the gist of what Instagram is about but let’s
just recap on the nuts and bolts.
Essentially then, Instagram is a social network that revolves around pictures. At its most
basic, Instagram is an image sharing suit but unlike something like Imgur the pictures
tend to be a little more personal. This is not where you would upload an image to share
with a client for instance – the image quality wouldn’t even be high enough for most
uses.
Instead, Instagram is about telling your story or finding beautiful moments in the every
day. It’s about being personal and it’s about keeping people up-to-date with your
activities.
So if you were to go on holiday, you might take hundreds of photos for Facebook but
Instagram would be where you’d upload the select few highlights or the beautiful picture
of that sunset/that empty pint on the beach. This is about expression.
The relatively low image quality and square dimensions are in service of this artistic
bent, as are the ‘filters’ that Instagram lets you apply. Once you have cropped your
photo into a square, you then have the option to apply filters that will alter the
brightness, contrast, structure, saturation, warmth etc. to create a number of effects.
Photos can be made to look vintage, colors can be brought out or subdued and
generally you can alter the mood and impact of your image in a variety of ways.
Once you’ve done this, you then have the option to add tags to your images. These
work in the same way as tags on Twitter – they describe what is in the image and then
allow other people to find your image by searching. These tags will be added using the
‘hashtag’ symbol ‘#’ and can be placed right inside your description.
If you took a photo of yourself working out then, you might write ‘Getting some pump on
#legsday! #workout #fitness’.
This way, anyone who searched for #fitness shortly after would see your picture come
up – until it was buried by other pictures with the same hashtag (which wouldn’t take
very long!). Later in this book, we’ll examine how to pick the best hashtags for optimal
visibility.
Also in your description, you can tag other users using the ‘@’ symbol. You can also tag
users in the pictures themselves, much like on Facebook.
Instagram also has the ability to ‘message’ photos with Instagram direct. And as with
Twitter, it’s possible for users to ‘follow’ accounts that they like and then to be updated
regularly with new content as it gets uploaded by said account. Simply tap on the name
of the person who uploaded the photo and then click ‘follow’. As a business on
Instagram, getting lots of follows is going to be your main objective.
What you might have noticed about all this is that it isn’t immediately conducive to
marketing. That is to say, that people on Instagram are largely there to see updates
from their friends and family and to see beautiful pictures uploaded by the likes of the
National Geographic. This is where people come to see the ‘beauty in everyday life’.
This in turn means you need to be very strategic about the way you market here – but it
can be done.
Here are a few compelling reasons that you should be on Instagram…
Remember when I said that Instagram wasn’t as big as Facebook? You should do, it
was only about 10 minutes ago… Well, it’s important to remember that this is all relative.
Sure, it’s not as big as Facebook but then nothing is. That doesn’t mean it’s not
objectively pretty large though – in fact Instagram is still huge. Specifically Instagram
announced in December 2014 that it had surpassed 300 million users. That’s a pretty
large number and especially when you consider that it had only 200 million users nine
months before that… In other words, Instagram is growing and fast.
And while you might think of Instagram as one of the ‘smaller’ social networks, this is in
fact not true at all. Because in fact, Instagram has more users now than Twitter! This is
likely owing to its broader appeal.
Things get even crazier when you consider how effective Instagram can be when used
synergistically with the likes of Facebook and Twitter. You can instantly share Instagram
images on Facebook and Twitter via built-in controls and the connection is actually very
close indeed. The format of Instagram is very similar to Twitter as it uses hashtags and
tags and this means that you can upload content to Instagram and it will act as though
you were uploading content to Twitter. There’s even a section on Facebook for your
Instagram photos. Why? Because Instagram is actually now owned by Facebook.
This provides the perfect way for you to tie all your social media accounts together, to
save a lot of time uploading to multiple different channels and to increase your brand
visibility. It even plays nicely with Pinterest, which just so happens to be another sorely
under-utilized social network for marketers.
On top of all that, Instagram is actually a great place to sell. According to recent studies,
a lot of users actually use Instagram to shop – and some users even use Instagram
primarily for shopping!
To put this in numbers, 70% of those surveyed by Iconosquare in 2015 stated that they
have at some point sought out a brand on Instagram. 62% have followed brands that
they love, while 41% said they would be happy to hear about giveaways and discounts
through Instagram. 65% said that rather than being intrusive, they actually find it
flattering when a brand likes their post.
Meanwhile, according to studies based on research firm L2, Instagram users are far
more engaged than users on Facebook or Twitter – 18 times more in fact! That means
that if a brand posts something, it’s much more likely to see actual interaction with
users.
As though that wasn’t enough reason to start investing in Instagram big time, it’s also
worth remembering that Instagram is drastically under-estimated by a lot of businesses
and internet marketers. In other words, your competition most likely isn’t making the
most of Instagram right now and this will make it much easier for you to stand out and
get noticed! Get there now and you’ll be able to build a big following before every other
company in your industry jumps on the bandwagon.
Finally, there’s the amazing ROI that Instagram offers. Brands love Twitter because it’s
so incredibly easy for them to upload content. The same can be said of Instagram – if
you know how to take great photos, upload them and add tags, you can keep a very
active account with just a few minutes a day or even a few minutes a week!
Instagram Marketing -1
Reading the above statistics you’ll likely have been a little surprised. Instagram is bigger
than Twitter and better for engagement than Facebook! Time to get on it!
But why is Instagram so good for interaction? What is it about this channel that makes it
potentially a gold mine for companies hoping to make an impression on their
prospective audiences? Especially considering that on the face of it, Instagram seems
very much more geared towards sharing personal content with no marketing angle?
Well actually, it’s this focus and this limitation that actually makes Instagram so
effective.
You see, people are very cynical of businesses and they’re very tired of seeing the
same marketing message over and over again. It’s incredibly annoying then to head
onto Facebook to have a chat with your friends, or to see photos of your new niece, only
to them be bombarded for offers for products saying ‘CLICK HERE!’, ‘ENTER YOUR
EMAIL!’, ‘BUY NOW!’. Is it any wonder people aren’t engaging?
On Instagram though, there is no ‘click here’ or ‘buy now’. Rather, there’s just – here’s a
photo of us working in our office, a funny meme, a picture of something that
encapsulates the subject you’re interested in, a new product framed artistically… This is
far less invasive.
As such, brands on Instagram come across much more genuine and don’t appear to
have the same obvious ulterior motive.
At the same time, because you’re forced to create something artistic and interesting on
Instagram, that will help to make your business seem much more trendy, artistic and
interesting itself. A company that is constantly uploading pictures of sunsets, of their
products in amazing lighting or of inspirational messages is going to seem much more
savvy and in tune with their customers as opposed to a company that keeps just
featuring large banners telling people to buy stuff…
The Objective
Instagram is potentially highly lucrative for brands then and is a very smart place for
them to invest their time and their money. While this may be true though, it’s also very
different from other platforms and other social networks. What this means, is that it you
need to approach it differently and you need to have different objectives lest you be
disappointed.
So what does this mean? For starters, you need to be aware that Instagram isn’t about
making direct sales and conversions. You can’t include live links in your description that
will send people anywhere, so you can’t have a ‘Click Here to Buy Now’ call to action
there. Remember: this is a good thing at the end of the day as far as your marketing is
concerned.
So instead, what you need to be focusing on is your brand’s visibility, popularity, loyalty
and authority. Your aim is to build followers on Instagram, so that they will see your
content and be constantly reminded about your brand and why it matters. Likewise, you
want the people who already like your brand to learn to like it even more and to be
constantly reminded that you exist and of all the great things they can buy.
This is very much a ‘slow burn’ marketing strategy then and it should not be measured
in terms of immediate ROI. This should be measured in terms of engagement, growth
and popularity. In the long term, this is actually much more valuable to you than a single
sale.
Creating Amazing Content for Instagram
So now you know the power of Instagram and you know what your overall objective is.
The next question, is how you go about populating your account with content that will
really stand out and get noticed.
Of course the majority of your content is going to be photos. The good news here is that
you won’t need a powerful camera to create these photos and can instead do a perfectly
good job with a simple phone camera. Remember, the dimensions of your Instagram
photos are relatively small and the filter is going to be able to hide any low resolution
anyway. A HD camera will give you more to work with and you should get one if
possible – but don’t worry if you don’t have one right away.
What does matter is the subject and what you’re going to be taking photos of. For a
brand, this can be a difficult question.
Obvious Instagram caters very well to creative brands and to companies that sell crafts,
clothing, ornaments or anything else that is aesthetically appealing and likely to appeal
to an audience that likes beautiful things. If you knit plush toys, or design shoes, then
you can upload pictures of these to show off your products in a very stylish way.
Restaurants and food companies meanwhile can be highly successful showing images
of what they’re cooking or preparing.
Surprisingly, this will also work very well for technology companies, car manufacturers –
even companies creating kitchen cutlery. Technology nerds can get surprisingly excited
about some ‘sexy’ new hardware and if you compose the shot correctly, this can be very
effective. Services might also work – whether you show photos of the beautiful websites
you’ve helped to create, or you upload images of your team looking over the shoulder of
someone working at the computer (for a consultant).
Another angle is to think of the lifestyle and the ‘value proposition’ surrounding your
brand. There’s a saying that you ‘don’t sell hats, you sell warm heads’. What is the
equivalent of your ‘warm head’?
In other words, if your company sells fitness equipment then you can upload photos of
the equipment but you can also upload photos of the lifestyle. This could mean a photo
of a taped and chalked hand, ready to grab a pull up bar. It could mean a photo of an
empty protein shaker, or it could mean a picture of a figure running on the horizon
against a sunrise. Maybe it means a picture of someone looking very confident and in
great shape on the beach?
If you sell holidays, then your photos should be of exotic locations, people relaxing in
pools and people backpacking across the desert.
This also works for services. If your company offers consultation, legal advice,
accounting… then you might have pictures synonymous with business and success:
such as people looking out from their office block on the 20th floor, city lights at night, or
hands shaking. In all these cases, you need to think about making the image look good
in itself and you need to think about how it’s going to make the people reading feel. You
need to think about your target demographic and how they want to feel. Ultimately, if
your images inspire positive emotions, then you’ll get followers.
A completely different approach to take meanwhile might be to show images of your
personal life. This is useful for bloggers and entrepreneurs who want to create a
personal brand. Actors, bloggers, digital marketers, musicians, gurus, YouTube stars
and more all have Instagram accounts that show what they’re getting up to.
The objective here is to allow your fans and followers a glimpse into your lifestyle so
they can feel like they know you. This will build your brand loyalty and your authority and
it will make you more likeable, thus increasing the chance that someone will buy from
you. While the objective here is to provide an honest insight into your lifestyle though,
remember that you also want yourself to appear knowledgeable and if you’re promoting
a certain lifestyle or product then you want to imply that this actually works.
What this means, is that you again need to think about the way your photos will make
the viewers feel. Try and showcase your lifestyle in a way that makes it seem desirable
and that makes you seem successful and confident – this will make your followers more
likely to want to listen to your advice. Selfies are really popular on Instagram of course
and this is the perfect place to use them.
Finally, note that your Instagram content can also be designed to provide value as
information or as entertainment. A great example of this would be a restaurant that also
provided recipe ideas, or perhaps a clothing company that offered style suggestions and
tips. Many people follow fashion accounts on Instagram to get ideas for clothes
combinations as well as inspiration regarding good outfits and looks. You can also
provide inspiration via Instagram, tips, news, ideas for nights out… Think about what fits
with your brand and how you can deliver useful information in a visual format.
How to Take Amazing Photos
Taking amazing photos is something that requires practice, something of a creative eye
and a bit of luck. We’re not going to be able to cover the entire topic here but we can
nevertheless provide a few tips that will help.
For starters then, make sure that you always think about your foreground, your middle
ground and your background. Think about your composition as well in terms of wherethe ‘subject’ (focus) of your photo is and what the background is like around this point.
From there, try mixing things up and making it more interesting.
‘Interesting’ is the important word here because often a lot of pictures simply are not
interesting. Look at most people’s holiday snaps for instance and they will consist of
people standing, cross armed, in front of some kind of backdrop. This is such a generic
picture that it is completely boring – and with no reference for scale, it’s impossible to
get a sense of what it felt like to be there – they may as well be in front of a green
screen! Meanwhile, the front-on shot of that person, smiling awkwardly, evokes no
emotion and isn’t particularly flattering.
So what could you do to make that picture look more interesting? For starters, you might
move the focal point slightly. How about putting the person on the left of the image, or
on the right? How about twisting the camera slightly? You can also get lower down and
take the shot from underneath in order to make the person look bigger and to create
even more of a sense of scale.
Next you would think about creating depth and three dimensions. To do this, you might
decide to add something in the foreground and keep it out of focus – how about a leaf
on a tree for instance? Or even a blade of grass? Having something lead into the
background from the foreground is another great way to create depth and scale – such
as a garden path.
Instead of having the person looking at the camera, why not have them gazing whistfully
into the distance? Sitting on a ledge? Or relaxing in the sun? This evokes much more
emotion and makes it easier for the viewer to imagine being there. You can also have
them doing something more interesting and perhaps interacting with the environment –
they could be leaning against a tree for instance, or they could have a leg up on a rock.
This also provides something else to give a sense of scale and perspective. Blurring out
the background is also an option and you can do this by zooming in on your subject and
then focusing on them – some cameras have a function called ‘macros’ especially for this, while phone cameras will often let you double tap on the item you want to focus in
on.
While taking these photos, you also need to think about the lighting. Lighting is
something that amateur photographers will often forget but it makes a huge difference
and can make a picture much more flattering (or less so) for the person in it. Aim for
‘Rembrandt lighting’ which means you’ll be lighting the photo from the side so that half
of the person’s face is lit. This creates more dynamic and interesting shadows. Always
avoid having the light source behind the subject as this creates glare – the exception is
when you’re purposefully creating a silhouette effect or a glare effect.
When you’re taking photos of your activities, try to find items that tell a bigger story. For
instance, if you want to tell the story of a party, then often you can do this with a half
empty glass of wine with some lipstick on it and perhaps the innards of a party popper.
Want to evoke the feeling of working into the night? Instead of taking a photo of you
working into the night, how about a photo of your keyboard next to a mug of coffee, lit by
desklamp spotlight? These kinds of photos are far more interesting and poetic than
photos that are ‘on the nose’.
Adding Filters
Now comes one of the most important aspects of Instagram which can completely
make-or-break your photos, regardless of how good they were to begin with.
Filters essentially apply a collection of effects to your pictures, altering the contrast,
warmth, saturation, sharpness, blur and more. Others might also apply effects like sepia
or black and white.
The filters available at the time of writing are: lark, reyes, juno, slumber, crema, Ludwig,
aden, perpetua, amaro, mayfair, rise, Hudson, velencia, x-pro II, sierra, willow, lo-fi,
earlybird, branna, inkwell, hefe and Nashville. Each filter also tends to be particularly
useful for evoking a particular theme or expressing an idea. Some make your image
look vintage or retro, others make your image look more elegant or artistic. You need to
think what you want to achieve with your photo.
At the same time, you also now have the option to manually adjust the effects on your
photos – something that wasn’t available until relatively recently. Options to adjust
include:
Adjust: For changing the angle and zooming in.
Brightness: For altering the brightness.
Contrast: For changing the difference between different tones.
Structure: This essentially adds detail to your images.
Warmth: This brings out or subdues the warmth in your images – so you can have more
reds, oranges and other warm tones, or more blues, whites and ‘cool’ tones.
Saturation: This is the amount of color in the image. Turn it all the way down for black
and white, or all the way up for overly vibrant, dream-like colors.
Color: This lets you choose a certain color to add more of in your image.
Fade: Fade lets you create the effect of your image having faded somewhat – this can
make it feel older.
Highlights: Increase/decrease the whites and light colors in your image.
Shadows: Increase/decrease the blacks and dark colors.
Vignet: Add darker corners to your photo to highlight the center.
Tilt Shift: Add a blur horizontally or surrounding the image in a circle. This lets you
create the sensation of movement or of focus. Using the linear blur in particular you can
make a landscape look miniaturized which is a fun effect.
The secret to using filters and effects well? That would be: less is more. If you ‘overdo’
your use of filters then this can end up looking cheap – as though you can’t take good
photos on your own. At the same time, it can seem as though you’re overexcited with all
the options and that you’re thus trying to get as many in at once as possible.
This is actually the reason that Comic Sans is considered to be such a poor choice of
font. Comic Sans came with the original version of Word when people were first getting
access to Word Processing. As the defacto ‘fun’ choice of typeface, everyone started
using Comic Sans in all of their work and all this did was offend legitimate graphic
designers who could tell that the font had actually been poorly designed. You could also
compare over-using filters to over-using transition effects in videos. When done well,
these sorts of embellishments shouldn’t draw attention to themselves but should rather
blend quietly into the background.
That said, using one of the filters occasionally when you think your picture could benefit
from looking a little retro, a little vintage or a little artsy is a great way to keep things
fresh. Likewise, you should can use blurs to make your camera look more impressive
than it really is, or to highlight certain points of interest in your pictures. Tilt-shifting is
also a good choice a lot of the time. A lot of scenery pictures look even better when you
slightly turn up the saturation.
Of course there’s only so much you can do with a few filters and a few effects. If you
want your photos to truly look amazing then you need to think outside the box and start
using professional photo editing software. There’s no reason for instance that you can’t
first do some editing in PhotoShop or Illustrator before you upload your image to
Instagram. Using PhotoShop for instance, you might opt to remove blemishes and spots
from your face or the face of your subject/model. This is important if you’re trying to sell
a particular lifestyle – you can’t look confident, sexy and successful if you have a cold
sore!
For lighter image editing, another good app is Pixlr. Pixlr is a photo editing app that lets
you not only edit your images by applying a few effects and text but also by rearranging
them. You can use Pixlr to create little collages for instance or mood boards. This can
be a great tool if you want to take 3 photos from a recent event and arrange them in a
way that tells a story. Likewise, it’s also very useful if you want to add some text Pixlr is
practically designed to be used with Instagram and this is a match made in heaven
when you use the two together.
You might also want to try Meme Generator if you’re interested in making funny memes.
Memes are often a safe way to get lots of likes and shares, as are inspirational quotes –
you can get lots of motivational poster makers too online.
Videos for Instagram
Another great feature on Instagram is the ability to upload short videos, which is
somewhat similar to Vine or to SnapChat. You can use this to talk directly to your
viewers, to tell a short story or to convey something that you can’t put across in words –
you can even place a small advert here – though again you don’t want it to be too ‘on
the nose’ in terms of marketing.
Something that’s currently very popular is to use an app called ‘Lapse It’. As you may
have guessed by the name, Lapse It is a time-lapse app which means it will ‘film’ you for
a while by taking photos once every 1, 10, 60 etc. seconds. This then creates a video
that shows you changing position rapidly and which can tell a much better story in a few
seconds than a regular video.
Lapse It can be used for instance to show you and your friends playing in the sea or on
the beach if your video is about travel, it can be used to show time passing while you
work at the computer, it could be used to show a workout in a short space of time… etc.
Definitely one to consider adding!
Using Tags
You could have the very best photos in the world though; if no one looked at them it
wouldn’t help you much! In other words, you need to ensure you’re providing a way for
your visitors to find your content and the best way to do that is with tags. Tags tell
people what your photos are about and they can be used for comic effect or to make
interesting observations. At the same time though, your tags are also about getting
found in the first place – so what you need to ask is what people are likely to search and
what isn’t already too crowded.
If you are in amazing shape and trying to promote your protein shake, then uploading a
photo of yourself topless after a workout is a great way to get tons of exposure. But this
depends entirely on the tags you use. If you add the tag ‘#fitness’ for instance, then you
shouldn’t expect it to bring you any views. Why? Because this tag is just too popular and
too widely used. In other words, hundreds or even thoughts of people upload photos
with this tag every few minutes and as such, your image will be buried as soon as you
upload it. On the other hand ‘#bossingit’ is probably a bit too obscure and unlikely to get
searched for often at all.
So instead, you might think of something like #obliques which is a little less
overcrowded but still popular, maybe #washboardabs, or maybe #gymmotivation. If
you’re unsure, then do a search before hand to see which tags are performing well for
other people but aren’t overly crowded.
Growing Your Following
Instagram is highly powerful and an amazing tool for growing your brand and getting
more attention for your products, services and ethos.
What Instagram is not though is magic. In other words, this isn’t a case of ‘build it and
they will come’. If you want to grow your audience and if you want to expand your reach,
you need to put in the time and effort to get more people to find your acco
unt and to get more people to follow.
The first way to do this is by using the right tags and by posting regularly. This way,
you’ll create more opportunities for people to find you on Instagram and you’ll bring
more and more people in to your page.
At the same time though, you can also rely on a few smart tricks to bring in even more
viewers… The success of your channel is largely going to come down to how ‘on the money’ you
are with your tone, message and photos. In other words, are you uploading the kind of
stuff that your target demographic want to see? Do you ‘get’ them?
The key to getting this right is taking some time to do the market research up front. In
other words, you shouldn’t just ‘guess’ who your audience are and what they’re
interested in: you need to get out there and do the research.
There are a number of ways you can accomplish this. One is simply to poll your
customers and to get them to tell you what sort of things they like. Another useful trick is
to look at popular Instagram accounts of your competition. What are they posting that’s
helping them to do so well? Likewise, which other Instagram accounts are your
customers following? This can also lead you to some tips and suggestions you can take
on board.
Consistency
Another big key to success is to stay consistent with your message and with your
content. In other words, if you have decided to make your Instagram account a place
where people can pick up fashion advice then keep it that way. Don’t suddenly veer into
new territory by uploading a picture of you out with your friends or on holiday. Likewise,
if your account is all about fitness, don’t upload a picture of your beer.
It’s fine to reach out from your direct niche from time to time but do keep in mind that
you should always keep your target audience and your message in mind when deciding
whether or not to upload any new content.
Integrating Instagram With Your Website
You can promote your Instagram account through your website in a number of ways.
The best way though is to consider adding a widget to your website which will show
your most recent Instagram images. This has numerous advantages. For starters, it
provides your website with a stream of regularly updated content that will ensure that it
always looks populated and doesn’t become a ‘ghost website’ (it’s highly unprofessional
to have a website and then never update it). At the same time, it provides your site with
something visual and personal – again great if you’re promoting a personal brand.
Moreover though, it can lead to people who visit your site directly following you on
Instagram. This is highly valuable when you think of your website like a sieve: all those
people who visit, leave and don’t come back are effectively lost to you forever and you
can no longer market to them. But when you have them following you on some kind of
social media, you’ll then be able to approach them again giving yourself multiple
opportunities to turn them into leads and customers.
You should also include a link to your main Instagram account somewhere on the site.
Many WordPress themes come with buttons linking out to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram
and YouTube along the top portion of the site.
Instagram and Other Social Media
Likewise, you can also integrate your social media accounts with Instagram and you
should. Luckily, Instagram makes this very easy by allowing you to tick the other
accounts you want to share to when you upload. This way you can easily have your
Instagram posts appear on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest etc. as well. When writing your
description and tag, think about how this will play on your other social media.
For accounts that aren’t integrated with Instagram, you can use the awesome tool
‘IFTTT’. IFTTT stands for ‘If This, Then That’ and it allows you to link all kinds of
different social media accounts, mobile apps and web apps so that an action on one
leads to a result on another.
So for instance, this might mean that when you upload something to Instagram, it
automatically gets uploaded to your WordPress site as well as a new post. This can also
be useful for a host of other things – for instance you can get all your Instagram images
to be added to DropBox as well so that you have them backed up.
So sharing across accounts is easy. At the same time though, you should also think
about updating your various social media profiles so that they all feature consistent
branding. Make sure that on Facebook, YouTube, Google+, LinkedIn etc. that your
cover image and your profile image are consistent and that they include your logo.
Likewise, use the same username so that there’s no confusion.
Finally – and this is something that will work on your website too – don’t be afraid to
outright ask your followers on other social media to start following you on Instagram too.
At the end of your next YouTube video for instance, just mention to your viewers that
you have an Instagram account and they should follow you because XYZ. On
Facebook, likewise you can structure a post like: enjoy this content? Then you’ll love our
Instagram account!
Getting People Involved
Another strategy that businesses use to increase their follower count on Instagram is to
try and get their existing audience to help them attract more people. There are a number
of ways that this can be done
Running Contests
One great way to do this is to run a contest. Here, you will simply offer a prize for people
taking a certain picture and uploading it with a tag. If you have a product such as a
smartphone for instance, then you can ask your followers to post photos of themselves
on your smartphone. If you have a certain item of clothing or a pair of shoes, then you
can have a ‘fashion contest’ and get your followers to post their outfit combinations that
revolve around the item that you sell. They then simply tag your brand in the picture, or
they use a particular hashtag and you assess the winners and award a prize.
This is fantastic for you because if you get lots of people to join in you can gain huge
exposure across the participants’ networks. At the same time, they will be engaging with
you, they’ll be showing off your product in dynamic photos and they’ll generally be
acting like ambassadors for your brand – it’s the perfect scenario!
Featuring User’s Images
Another option is simply to occasionally feature the images of other customers. This
way, you just say that the best images that your tagged in that have a certain tag, you
will ‘regram’ for your audience. This is fun exposure for them but for you it means you’ll
consistently have a large number of users engaging with your brand and linking to it.
This is a little like a low-level contest that will go on continuously.
Caption Contest
Caption contests are a great way to get people to engage with your photos and
comment below, which in turn will help to make your account look active and will get you
more likes. Just take an obscure picture and then add ‘Caption contest!!’ in the
description.
Getting Likes
As a side note, getting likes (which look like a heart on Instagram) is a powerful strategy
on Instagram as it will help you to get seen by more people. That’s because there is a
section on Instagram where you can see all the content that your friends on there have
liked. This means that if people like your photos, they will show up in that section for
more other people.
Commenting, Liking and Following
If you want to take a more active approach to growing your network, then another thing
you can do is to comment on other people’s images, like them and follow people.
Remember earlier we said that 65% of Instagram users find this flattering? This also
plays to one of the big strengths of Instagram in particular – which is its highly
narcissistic nature. That is to say, that if you should like a picture someone has taken on
Instagram, they will almost always be at least intrigued enough to look into your
username and see what you have on your account. If they like what they see, they
might just follow. The same goes for commenting (especially if you say something kind
and/or witty) and for following (which works best if that person is clearly directly in your
target demographic).
So an active form of marketing you can do on Instagram is simply to browse through
images that have been recently uploaded by looking for hashtags relevant to your brand
and then to comment, like and follow the people you find that way. As a result, you’ll find
that you generate some interest and some significant new followers.
Double Tap If…
Want to get more likes? A smart little trick you can use is to upload an image and then
add the text ‘If…’. For instance, a picture of Bruce Lee with the text ‘Double Tap if You
Think This Man is a Legend’ is likely to get you a huge amount of likes!
Influencer Marketing
The above strategies can be used to try and help you get a large quantity of new
followers but this is really just one of two big ways you can work with other users on
Instagram. The other big way is to stop focusing on quantity and to instead narrow down
and focus on quality.
This is what’s known as ‘influencer marketing’. Influencer marketing means that you find
someone who already has a large following on your chosen social platform and who has
established themselves as an authority. These people will have the ability to sway the
opinions of large groups of followers – which is where you eventually want to be.
Instead of spending months or years trying to reach this point then, instead why not
piggy back on the success of someone who has already gotten there?
In other words, why not see if you can’t get someone to post on your behalf to their
audience? Of course there needs to be something ‘in it’ for them and this could mean
that you pay them, that you promote them in exchange for them promoting you (like an
adswap) or you could just try targeting influential members of the public and hope that
they’ll like your brand enough to do it for free.
One tool you can use to this end is Instagram Direct, which is essentially a way of
sending a picture to an individual user. This is a great way to show an influencer
something that you’ve done that they might be interested in, or that you think their
audience might be interested in. If you’re lucky, they may give you a shoutout!
Real World Networking
Very often social media marketing can become even more effective when you combine
it with real-world networking. This is certainly true of LinkedIn and it’s very true of
Instagram.
great example of how this can work comes not from Instagram but from Twitter. Do you
know what the most retweeted tweet of all time is? That would be the selfie that Ellen
Degeneres took at the Oscars and which featured the likes of Brad Pitt, Bradley Cooper,
Kevin Spacey and Angelina Jolie. Why was this picture so successful? No doubt
because each of those stars would also have retweeted it and that this would then in
turn have been retweeted by many of there collective millions of fans.
What does all this have to do with Instagram? Simple: if you can bag a selfie with
yourself and someone who has a fair amount of clout, then you have a legitimate
excuse to tag them and to include them in your marketing. As a result, your content will
then be seen by all of their followers which can then lead to lots more people following
you. This is one of the few ways you can almost guarantee that you will get to partake in
influencer marketing and it almost doesn’t require their actual participation!
This is a very big and important reason to go to networking events if you aren’t already!
If you go to events where you’re likely to meet lots of other marketers, you’ll potentially
be able to gain access to all their followers through social media!
How Are Businesses Actually Using
Instagram?
Creating great photos to promote your product or service is the basic strategy that pretty
much any business will use to promote itself online.
But there are other more inventive things you can do here as well. At the same time, it
can certainly be helpful to look at other companies to see how their Instagram account
is being used for inspiration.
Here are some examples of companies that are using Instagram well then…
Sharpie
Sharpie has a very popular account on Instagram and is a fantastic match between
brand and medium. The great thing about Sharpies is that they can be used to create
images and messages and these are what you will find when you visit the Instagram
account. The other great thing about Sharpie is that they manage to encourage the
involvement of their users and followers who can post their own messages too. The
Instagram account has shown the company to be hip and on the ball, it has
demonstrated the versatility of their product and it has led to a lot of new sales!
Red Bull
Red Bull is simply fantastic at social media. On Facebook, Twitter and YouTube they
are constantly uploading videos and images of people doing flips on bikes, performing
amazing athletic feats and generally living the ‘Gives You Wings’ message. On
Instagram things are no different and you have images and video clips of surfing,
motocross, festivals, mountain ranges and more. This is a great example of a company
that doesn’t sell a visual product, nevertheless succeeding in a visual medium by
focusing on the lifestyle, the message and the ‘feeling’ of what goes down well on
Instagram.
Starbucks
Starbucks is another company that has shown itself to be very savvy with social media.
The company has a presence on pretty much every social media site and is likewise
doing very well on Instagram. They encourage engagement in a positive way by posting
the photos that their customers submit and they have a lot of humor on display too and
the ability to poke fun at themselves. This is a great way for any company to get people
to warm to it. At the same time, Starbucks wins because it again sells a lifestyle –some
people are passionate about coffee and coffee is also a big deal in a lot of foreign
cultures – all things that the company has taken full advantage of!
Arnold Schwarzenegger
For those looking for a personal brand to emulate, Schwarzenegger is a particularly
good example. On his account he shows images of red carpet openings, posters for his
movies, workouts in the gym and personal messages for his fans. There’s a lot of humor
on the account but also a great insight into what his life is like. He’s done a great job this
way of staying relevant even as he is getting older and a lot of younger celebrities can
learn from him! He’s also big on Twitter, Facebook and even SnapChat!
Beyond the Weak
Beyond the Weak is a fitness brand that sells t-shirts and other products and that has a
pretty smart system going. The brand simply shares images of followers who take
photos of themselves working out, especially when they’re wearing their t-shirts. This
way, they get a lot of free promotion from other users and have very effectively engaged
their user base.
L.A. Clippers
L.A. Clippers are a fantastic example of a company that does Instagram well. Of course
the L.A. Clippers are a basketball team and they use their account to post awesome
images of players taking shots, training, working and more. These photos are dynamic,
dramatic and with great choices of filters – they look like they belong in a magazine.
Target Style
Target Style is a fashion company that shows off its clothes, outfits and ideas in an
amazing series of photos. Not only do they do this with pictures of people wearing their
clothes, but also with photos of people backstage, of fashionable interior décor, of
happy looking people and generally of things to take on holiday… It’s a great place for
people to get inspiration and to feel fashionable simply by following and it’s great for
selling the company’s products.
How Companies Are Using Instagram Influencer Marketing
We discussed the concept of influencer marketing earlier and saw how it could be highly
beneficial for any business. How are other brands using this strategy?
One good example is Birchbox, which teamed up with lifestyle blogger Emily Schuman,
who runs Cupcakes and Cashmere. They got her to curate their May box of products
and she in turn posted five separate Instagram images promoting the partnership.
Between those five images, she managed to generate 18,000 likes for the brand and
reached over 550,000 users.
Boxed Water is a brand with a very eco friendly message. They work with influencers
like Jaime King, Megan DeAngelis and Aidan Alexander and have a campaign where
they will plant two trees for every image with the #Retreehashtag. This generated 2,600
photos with the tag in the space of one month.
This is something interesting to consider for your own brand. People love getting behind
a cause and they love getting behind a message. If you’re a charity, or if you’re supporting a charity, you’ll find it much easier to find influencers you can work with. You
don’t have to be a charity to benefit though – just make sure that you have a clear
mission statement and that your business stands for something more than just ‘earning
money’. Even the most cynical businesses normally started with some kind of aspiration
– even if it was just to provide delicious food and make the world a tastier place. Try to
remember what that mission statement was and then start shouting it from the rooftops
and getting people to believe it. Sell it through your imagery and use it to get more
influencers on board!
Local Marketing with Instagram
A lot of what we’ve looked at here will work particularly well for online businesses.
Ecommerce stores have a lot to gain from Instagram because they can highlight
products that are just a few clicks away for their followers. Likewise, bloggers can use
Instagram to grow their personal brand and to help their followers and fans feel
connected.
But it can also have particular use for local businesses. If you have a chip shop, a hair
dressers or anything else, then you might want to alter your strategy slightly but it can
still be very effective.
The first thing to consider using here is the location tag. You can tag your images by
location and this then allows people nearby to find them. This is a great way to improve
your chances of being found for the specific target demographic that you’re aiming. After
all, if you run a hair salon then there’s not really much point in you having followers all
around the world, unless you’re planning on franchising soon!
Another tip is to use local hashtags. People will often look for hashtags in their local
area and this is a great way to discover things that are going on. It works on Twitter too,
so if you also share your posts to Twitter you can bring people in this way. Likewise, you
should search for local hashtags regularly and then comment on and like the pictures
that you find. This works particularly well for tourist attractions. Why? Because when we
travel, we will actually be more likely to use local hashtags. You don’t tend to put your
location as a tag in every single one of your photos at home – but if you’re visiting
another part of the country you’re more likely to use those hashtags. If you then see that
your photo has been liked or commented on by ‘Nights Out in Buckinghamshire’ then
you might be inclined to have a look and see if it’s something that might interest you!
And remember: real world networking also works very well when it comes to Instagram.
If you run a local business, then chances are that you will interact with lots of customers
who have Instagram accounts on a face-to-face basis – and they will likewise probably
have a large number of local followers. If you have a customer come into your store
then, ask them to follow you on Twitter. Better yet – get a photo with them in it and then
tag them in it! This can also be a fantastic way to promote your product. So for instance,
if you run a hair salon, then why not take a picture of each of your customers with their
new hair and tag them in it? Ask their permission first of course but you’ll likely find that
most people are more than willing to agree to be featured. This way, all their friends in
the local area will see what a good job you’ve done and will be more likely to get in
touch if they want a hair cut. This also works for restaurants – why not take photos of
your guests and ask if you can tag them? Or tell them to see their pictures on your
Instagram account? This gives them a great reason to seek you out and to start
following you. You can do the same in clubs and bars too, for organized events and
much more!
Note here that people are far more likely to agree to be tagged, to add you on Instagram
and to generally take part if you take the effort to get to know them and to be friendly
when they come into your store. If you go into a shop, buy a product and then leave,
you’ll likely ignore any offer to follow them on Instagram. But if that store owner takes an
interest in you, if they go the extra mile to help you find the perfect product, if they
introduce themselves by name… then those people will often feel far more inclined to
follow you or to take part in your promotions. If nothing else they will often do so simply
out of politeness!
This is a key fact to realize in all of your marketing online – it should be a real extension
of who you are and of what you want to portray.
Analyzing Your Instagram Work
Now you have all the information you need to start running a highly effective Instagram
campaign that helps to add value to your business, that will send the message you want
to send and that will bring many more followers to your brand. This is a highly effective
tool and if you follow these tips to the letter, you’ll find it offers an amazing ROI.
But while you have a lot of information now, that doesn’t guarantee that your strategy is
going to be flawless right from the start. In fact it is still highly unlikely that this will be the
case. What’s more likely is that you’ll start off slowly, make lots of mistakes and
generally take an awfully long time to develop a really big following.
The point is: to be successful you really need to spend some time knee deep in
Instagram marketing to learn what works and what doesn’t. This means giving it a go,
looking at what works and what doesn’t and then gradually honing and improving your
strategies and your offerings.
This is key in any area of internet marketing. Getting feedback, analyzing your data and
looking at what works is how you evolve your strategy to become optimized for the
market that you’re in.
Unfortunately, when you compare Instagram to something like Google AdWords, the
tools available for assessing your performance are relatively lacking. You just don’t have
access to the same level of data that you do with those tools. So how do you get around
this and continue to improve at your Instagram marketing?
One method is simply to pay attention and to take notes. Compare what is working with
what isn’t and take note of which hashtags bring in the most hits.
Here’s one great thing about Instagram: there’s no reason that you can’t keep using the
same hashtags over and over again. In other words, if you’ve uploaded an image that
has gone mad on Instagram with a certain hashtag, then there’s no reason that you
can’t use the exact same hashtags and expect to get roughly the same response! There are also a number of different tools out there you can use to give yourself access
to more data. One of these is TOTEMS. TOTEMS (totems.co) gives you access to in
depth analytics for your various different posts so you can see which ones work best
and you can break down your audience and demographics. At the same time, this also
allows you to find the most influential users in your niche – this way you can find people
to work with for your influencer marketing.
Remember: the way that Instagram works means that your goals are going to be slightly
different here versus using a channel like Facebook. In other words, your aim is not to
get direct conversions or traffic necessarily. So don’t use that as a metric to measure
your success. Instead, look at your likes, your follows and your general engagement to
see what’s working.
Conclusion
And there you have it! That’s everything you could possibly need to know about
Instagram marketing in order to achieve true excellence. At this point you know what
Instagram is, how it works and how to use the myriad features and options to your
advantage. What’s more though, you also have some insight as to the psychology of
Instagram and you know some of the advanced techniques you can use to hack your
growth and explode onto the scene. To round it all off then, let’s structure all that
information into a plan that can really work for you and that you can adapt to suit your
Finally, consider these vital Instagram marketing ‘dos and don’ts’ to guide you as you
head forward in your efforts.
DO engage with your audience, respond to comments and generally stay active.
DON’T let your account become a ghost town with no new photos and no new
comments or likes.
DO use your real-world networking to help enhance your Instagram efforts.
DO put real thought into your images.
DO consider using stock images when you’re at a loss, such as those from Compfight.
DON’T upload content that doesn’t gel with your mission statement, your tone or your
niche. A consistent and strong brand identity is key.
DO create a good logo to use across all your social media.
DON’T be too salesy or pushy. Instagram is not the place for that.
DON’T measure your success based on conversions – Instagram is about art,
expression and the personal touch.
DO think about the lifestyle you want to portray and the emotion behind that.
DO look for the beauty and the artistic opportunity in everyday activities.
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