More companies than ever are using Instagram for business purposes – over 200 million companiesto be exact.
Instagram has proven to be a worthwhile investment for marketing purposes. We surveyed more than 650 global marketers in January 2024 and they felt that Instagram is more likely to have a high ROI than any other platform and it is the platform that will receive the most investment from them in 2024.
If you’ve only used Instagram for personal use, getting started can seem intimidating to use it for business purposes. Here we explore how you can use Instagram for business to promote your business on Instagram.
Table of contents
How to use Instagram for business
Let’s look at the six strategies you need to use to get the most out of Instagram.
1. Add value with your content.
First and foremost, Instagram is a visual platform. To attract an audience, it’s important that you invest time in providing high-quality, thoughtful content.
To be successful on Instagram, it’s important to create valuable content that attracts an audience and encourages them to engage with your business. Think about how you can delight your customers while remaining loyal to your brand.
For example, Hot pockets sells microwaveable pocket sandwiches. Admittedly, I wasn’t a huge fan of Hot Pockets – until I started following their company’s Instagram account.
There are only so many ways to post a picture of a sandwich. Hot Pockets goes in a different direction. Instead, it engages its audience through humor, often posting relevant memes or funny quotes.
For example, in response to @ShallowDivers’ claim that Hot Pockets are not sandwiches, Hot Pockets responded as follows:
Ultimately, it may take some trial and error to find the content that works best for your business.
While Hot Pockets relies on humor, other brands like it The north wall Use impressive adventure images to appeal to the target audience.
The point is that brands need to create value for the Instagram community instead of just using the platform for advertising. This is crucial to your long-term success.
Looking for more tips on how to use Instagram to positively impact your business? Check out these Instagram hacks in the video below.
Put these tips into action and upgrade your marketing mantra from “Content is King” to “Value Content is King.”
2. Keep a consistent theme.
Think of each Instagram post as a single page on your website.
While each post should be good on its own, ideally you need to create a cohesive theme to maintain audience loyalty. In fact, using a consistent voice and aesthetic across your Instagram page is the #3 strategy Instagram marketers are using this year.
It’s important to note that I mean “topic” in the broadest sense, as it refers to everything from hashtags and captions to images and videos. You need to create a consistent tone of voice and feed aesthetic.
Ultimately, the more specific and consistent you are with your posts, the more likely you are to attract your most authentic audience.
You may think it’s better to appeal to more people through different topics, but ultimately standing out in a specific niche will help you build stronger and more authentic connections.
For example, consider MVMT. The feed is certainly consistent, with similar filters and color palettes and an emphasis on darker, edgier images:
Its continuity is also clear in the captions, with phrases like “Create a life you can’t wait to wake up to” and “Unexplored paths lead to undiscovered stories.” In every post you’ll see the same hashtag: #jointhemvmt.
Undoubtedly, his followers expect and prefer this type of content, otherwise they wouldn’t have followed him in the first place. In order to continue to delight customers, it is important that MVMT stays true to its motto.
3. Interact with your audience.
Interacting with your audience makes your followers feel valued and therefore more connected to your company.
There are many ways to engage with your audience. You can respond to comments on your posts, participate in comment threads, host contests or giveaways, use the Instagram Stories polls feature, or engage followers in your Stories, especially if they post something relevant to your brand.
Halo Top Creamery does a fantastic job of connecting with his audience.
There are often cute ice cream pictures with the caption “Ice cream tastes better with friends. Tag a friend you would like to eat this with.” posted.
A simple “Tag a Friend” headline is an effective strategy for growing your audience because your followers will then tag friends who may not know anything about you.
Additionally, Halo Top often runs contests and giveaways, such as this one:
By identifying winners in its posts, Halo Top creates an incentive for other followers to engage with the brand in the future. Additionally, Halo Top’s freebies show a real commitment to engaging with its audience.
4. Consider influencer marketing.
As a consumer, you’ve probably seen the recent influx of influencer marketers on Instagram – and for good reason.
Social media marketers we surveyed in 2024 said Instagram offers the second-highest ROI of all platforms when working with influencers/creators.
By harnessing the power of an influencer who already has an authentic connection with their audience and is seen as a trusted source of information, you can increase brand awareness and increase sales.
Micro-influencing, in particular, is a huge opportunity for brand support.
You could use your budget and resources to invest in traditional advertising, but it is often easier to create a more targeted and effective marketing campaign through influencer marketing.
Ultimately, influencers have already built an engaged, loyal following. When you identify the right influencers for your niche, you are much more likely to find followers who genuinely enjoy and support your products or services.
5. Create an advertising campaign.
There are two reasons for this Use Instagram ads: to spread brand awareness or increase sales.
When creating an effective advertising campaign, it is important that you focus on one goal. An Instagram ad aimed at selling a product will look very different than one aimed at attracting followers.
For example, consider the following Green Chef Ad that appeared on my Instagram feed.
With various images of delicious food and a tempting $40 off discount, this is likely a high converting ad. It’s very clear what Greenchef’s goal is: to get people to buy their product.
YouTube, on the other hand, invested in Instagram ads for a completely different reason.
His advertisements with well-known singers like Camila Cabello attract followers to simply follow YouTube music Instagram channel (and ideally the YouTube music channel itself).
To implement an effective campaign, it is important that you decide what you want to achieve before you start creating it.
Once you’ve chosen a goal, you’ll want to create the ad creative. Similar to the first strategy, you need to create high-quality visual content if you want your ad to be successful. Look at other ads on Instagram and think about how you could replicate them.
Also, A/B test multiple variations of the same ad (changing the text, image, or audience for each version) to find what works best for your business.
When you’re ready to create your ad, you’ll need to use Facebook Ads Manager. Ads Manager allows you to, among other things, narrow down your audience (including location, age, and various interests of your ideal audience) and select your audience Advertising objectiveand analyze ad performance.
6. Use purchasable posts.
If you use Instagram for business, Shoppable Posts is a feature you should know well.
It allows you to create posts and tag your products and/or services to create a seamless shopping experience directly on the platform. It creates less friction for your followers and increases the chances of converting them into customers.
Before you start implementing these strategies, you’ll need one thing: an Instagram business profile.
What is a business profile on Instagram?
An Instagram business profile is a special account that Instagram offers to brands and organizations. With a business profile, you get access to additional features like Instagram Insights and the ability to run ads.
A business profile legitimizes your Instagram account and allows you to add important information like your business hours, location, and phone number.
Advantages and disadvantages of an Instagram business profile
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,“, you might think. “I don’t know what to think about getting involved in all this.”
Here are some helpful pros and cons to help you determine if a company profile is right for you before you get started:
Advantages
- Access metrics on how your posts and stories are performing.
- Ability to track how your followers interact with your content.
- Access to features necessary to run advertising campaigns.
- Get a feature to add URLs to Stories so you can send warm traffic to your website.
Disadvantages
- Be labeled as a company.
- Organic reach and visibility may be lower.
- You must also have a Facebook account to access advertising features.
For most brands, the benefits of a company profile outweigh the additional features and analytics. However, it is important that you consider your goals before taking action.
How to create a business Instagram profile
To create a business profile on Instagram, you must first create a personal Instagram account and then convert it to a business profile.
If you already have an Instagram account, skip to the next section for instructions on how to switch.
If you don’t have an Instagram account yet, there are two ways to get one:
- From the computer
- From a mobile device (IOS and Android)
For detailed steps, see our detailed article on How to create a business account on Instagram.
How to go to your company profile
Once you’ve set up an Instagram account, follow these simple steps when you’re ready to switch:
1. In the mobile app, go to your profile and select the hamburger menu (three stacked horizontal bars) in the top right corner.
2. Scroll down to “Your insights and tools” and tap “Account type and tools.”
3. Under Account Type, select Switch to a Professional Account.
4. Click “Next” in the pop-up menu.
5. Choose the best category description for your account, e.g. B. Blogger or Digital Creator, then click Done.
You can also toggle the “Show in Profile” button so that your selected category is visible to your profile visitors. The button is shown below.
And this is what the button looks like in a profile:
6. Next, select whether you are a YouTuber or a business.
The descriptions under each type will help you determine what is best for you based on the category you choose. Once selected, click “Next.”
If you don’t have a Facebook Business Page, you’ll need to create one before completing this step. If your Facebook page is already linked, skip to the next step.
7. Follow the instructions to continue setting up your account and customizing your profile.
8. Select Done.
Now you can start implementing your social media strategy on Instagram.
From here, you want to determine the audience you want to target, the aesthetic and tone you want to convey, and the content you want to create.
Top Instagram Advertising Tactics of 2024 (Data)
Here we will discuss some of the best Instagram advertising tactics that we have gathered from our collection Instagram Engagement Report 2024 Report.
Interaction with the audience
The main goal of marketers on Instagram in 2024 is to increase engagement. Therefore, it stands to reason that the most popular Instagram marketing strategy is audience interaction.
Interacting with your audience offers so much more than just engagement. It helps build a sense of community with your followers and allows you to get to know them better.
Content engagement
The most popular strategy prioritizes audience engagement, but respondents say they plan to invest most of their money into creating content that drives engagement on the platform.
Additionally, 44% of marketers say creating content that drives engagement offers the highest ROI.
Social media engagement signals that your content resonates with your audience. Whether it’s an in-feed post, story, or live stream, engagement can be a good indicator of the health of your page.
Wondering how to make your content more engaging? Try to create content that highlights your products/services. Our research shows that this type of content performs best on the platform.
You can also try the fun route. It offers the second highest performance, which adds up because funny content tends to be relatable and usually makes someone stop scrolling and pay attention.
Format also influences engagement, as most marketers primarily publish images. Seventy percent of marketers surveyed post images to the platform and say it has the highest ROI of all content formats.
Video is another effective tool, and data shows that sharing video content gets the most reach/impressions of any other format.
Product advertising
As shopping on Instagram continues to grow, it’s no surprise that marketers’ second biggest goal for 2024 is to promote their products/services.
Our research shows that running advertising campaigns is among the top five Instagram strategies and will generate the most investments in 2024. And as mentioned above, sharing content that showcases products/services offers the highest ROI of all content types
Instagram’s shopping tools are still evolving, but 71% of social media marketers who sell products on the Instagram app say the features have a high ROI. Most survey respondents also report that 25-50% of clicks on shoppable and linked posts result in purchases.
Over to you
Whatever your goal is, whether it’s increasing brand awareness or generating more sales, using Instagram for business will get you one step closer to that goal. Although not all Instagram tools offer high ROI, it’s worth trying them all to find what works best for your audience.
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in May 2020 and has been updated for completeness.