Instagram Marketing Strategy Tips

Social media is a crux of online mar­ket­ing strat­e­gy. Social media sweeps many plat­forms and engages audi­ences in ways we nev­er before expe­ri­enced. It allows brands to share their sto­ries that oth­er­wise get lost in pack­ag­ing, pric­ing, and posi­tion­ing and ulti­mate­ly, offers a new lens through which to view a company.

Insta­gram is only six years old, but it’s quick­ly made its way to the promi­nent social plat­forms for busi­ness­es. The pho­to-focused app allows com­pa­nies to use visu­al media to tell a com­pelling sto­ry, which sounds delight­ful and easy and obvi­ous­ly use­ful. How­ev­er, mas­ter­ing Insta­gram takes strat­e­gy, under­stand­ing, and com­mit­ment to sto­ry and aesthetic.

Suc­cess­ful Insta­gram mar­ket­ing cam­paigns com­bine sto­ry­telling with stun­ning images, effec­tive­ly cat­alyz­ing com­pa­nies to new, cozy posi­tions in consumer’s hearts and shop­ping pref­er­ences. Once the rela­tion­ships between com­pa­ny and con­sumer are cement­ed, sales are nat­ur­al and brands have the chance to reach their fullest potential.

Let’s look at strat­e­gy trips for cre­at­ing and exe­cut­ing a smart Insta­gram mar­ket­ing strat­e­gy so that you can opti­mize your online efforts and presence.

Insta­gram Mar­ket­ing Tips for Business:

• Ana­lyze results often. The best Insta­gram mar­ket­ing cam­paigns con­stant­ly review strat­e­gy efforts and ana­lyze results. Notice when inter­ac­tion is height­ened or reduced; which pho­tos prompt lik­ing and com­ment­ing; which types of sto­ries direct­ly trans­late to sales. By mon­i­tor­ing results, you can incor­po­rate more ele­ments that induce suc­cess, and imple­ment an over­all more effec­tive strategy.
• Build con­tent the­mat­i­cal­ly. Start with your objec­tive for your Insta­gram account, and then deter­mine a way to approach it the­mat­i­cal­ly. Are you show­cas­ing a brand aes­thet­ic? Giv­ing fol­low­ers a glimpse into behind the scenes? Using pho­tos for prod­uct pro­mo­tions? Post­ing quotes and pho­tos to set an over­all vibe of the brand? Whichev­er theme you choose, stick to it. Fol­low­ers stay loy­al because they like the con­tent you post; if you vary too often, you will con­fuse your fol­low­ers and like­ly lose them.
• Com­mu­ni­ty engage­ment. Encour­age com­mu­ni­ty engage­ment when­ev­er pos­si­ble. This fos­ters a more famil­ial vibe and makes fol­low­ers feel like you are all on one big team.
• Con­tent cal­en­dar. Using a con­tent cal­en­dar will keep you on track for post­ing con­sis­tent­ly and about impor­tant events and pro­mo­tions. Be flex­i­ble with the cal­en­dar. If a cur­rent event or for­got­ten birth­day pops up on the day of a less impor­tant sched­uled post, opt for the cur­rent day’s request and resched­ule the former.
• Con­tent vari­a­tion and ratio. Insta­gram offers sev­er­al types of con­tent: still pho­to­graph, pho­to­graph album (mul­ti­ple pho­tos), boomerang (short, mov­ing pho­to), video, image-col­lages, and more are on the rise. Make an effort to use the fea­ture options if you have the skillset to exe­cute the respec­tive pro­duc­tion. Unless you are a video account, stan­dard pho­tos should be the most con­sis­tent con­tent. Thread the oth­ers in spar­ing­ly, but con­sis­tent­ly so your con­tent is well-rounded.
• Deter­mine objec­tives. Before you get aggres­sive on your Insta­gram efforts (any social media efforts, real­ly), iden­ti­fy your objec­tives. Do you want more fol­low­ers to legit­imize your accounts? Do you want a chance to inter­act with con­sumers through com­ments? Do you want X num­ber of sales per post? Lay out your objec­tives so that you can cater each post to the goal and mea­sure suc­cess along the way. Com­mon objec­tives include con­nect­ing with influ­encers, shar­ing com­pa­ny news, recruit­ing new tal­ent and com­ple­ment­ing events or brand expe­ri­ences. It’s okay if your goals change; it’s impor­tant to always have them.
• Fol­low oth­er accounts. Believe it or not, users look at who you fol­low. The few­er accounts you fol­low, the eas­i­er it is for your fol­low­ers to under­stand the brand fam­i­ly and tribe you run with. Show what inter­ests your brand and which influ­encers are impor­tant. The accounts you fol­low can cre­ate a well-round­ed or a super niche per­son­al­i­ty for your brand.
• Keep an eye on hash­tags and loca­tions. Pop­u­lar hash­tags and geo-tags fluc­tu­ate, so type in your key­words to see which tags are most rel­e­vant- be sure to include these in your posts!
• Man­age inter­ac­tions. Stay on top of DMs and com­ment sec­tions. Reply as quick­ly as pos­si­ble! If com­ment­ing is pos­i­tive, respond in the pub­lic sec­tion. If you need to reply to a neg­a­tive com­ment, pub­licly address it in the com­ments by telling the com­menter to see their pri­vate mes­sages and resolve the issue there.
• Opti­mize Bio. Be con­cise in your bio and explic­it with what your Insta­gram page boasts. Update the URL link option any­time a post directs fol­low­ers to the bio.
• Team clar­i­ty – respon­si­bil­i­ties and roles. Iden­ti­fy which team remem­ber ful­fill which tasks so that con­tent nev­er goes unposted.
• User-gen­er­at­ed pho­tos and con­tent. Post­ing user con­tent is a great way to keep fol­low­ers engaged. Use judg­ment when pho­to qual­i­ty might neg­a­tive­ly impact your brand pre­sen­ta­tion and keep an eye out for influ­encers or fol­low­ers who are pho­to and videographers.
• Use an Insta­gram style guide. Intro­duce your team to a pre-fixed style guide to ensure con­tent consistency! 
  • Aes­thet­ic: col­ors, tones, hues, pro­fes­sion­al vibe
  • Cap­tions: stick to one type of cap­tion- short and wit­ty, moti­va­tion­al, pro­mo­tion­al or long narrative.
  • Com­po­si­tion: deter­mine your ide­al com­po­si­tion for your photos
  • Fil­ters, lux and cre­ative tools: don’t over­do the fil­ters, and stick to a com­mon one or two. Only use the fil­ter if it enhances the pho­to and keeps your feed consistent.
  • Hash­tags: use hash­tags when rel­e­vant and only when they have far reach. If you have your own hash­tag, use it in every photo.
  • Land­scape: crop your images so that they appear nice­ly across all shared media
  • Social shar­ing: share your Insta­gram posts through oth­er social media plat­forms to increase your Insta­gram account’s visibility.
  • Tag­ging: Tag­ging allows your pho­tos to show up in addi­tion­al pho­to boards, increas­ing your exposure.

 

SOURCE