Instagram is to companies what the baffles are at a concert, a dissemination tool extremely powerful and essential to the success in 2022.
Think you're missing out on what the world's most famous visual social network has to offer?
Through this article, we will give you the keys of a proper use of Instagram posts that will allow your brand to have visibility that it needs!
Key 1: Consistency is your first ally
Using social networks in 2022 is obvious. But why should businesses use them? How can using and creating Instagram content generate traffic and increase the sympathy capital of the consumers towards your brand ? Through this article, we will Develop how to use Instagram and its tools to increase your brand recognitionto establish it in people's minds, redirect users to your website, generate buzz, engagement, sales, and so on. improve performance of your company.
Instagram is 1.25 billion users worldwide in 2022, and more than 24 million monthly users in France. In other words, a social network mastodon. Did you know that? More than 80% accounts follow at least one company. These few figures speak for themselves. You have to be on Instagram!
Do you have something to offer? Don't say it, show it! In fact, according to a statistical research conducted by Rival IQthe commitment rate of the public on Instagram is 1,22 %compared to 0.09 % on Facebook and 0.048 % on Twitter. This shows the persuasive power of images on the consumer.
Why be regular on Instagram?
Consistency on Instagram is very important for two reasons.
- The first purely technical, is that Instagram likes regularity, and favors it, its algorithm is designed in such a way that regular pages are naturally highlighted by the network.
- The second reason, more psychological, is that an account that publishes regularly will naturally have a higher sympathy capital, because a certain link is created. A certain personal investment will naturally develop and therefore commitment.
We are always closer to a friend we see every day than to an acquaintance we hear from once a quarter. Here, it's the same, the regularity maintains the relationship with the customers and this relationship leads to the purchase.
To quote a study on the link between the consumer and his actions : "Yet, in everyday life, consumers who are loyal to their brand perform many acts of purchase and consumption. So we can ask whether the accumulation of acts helps stabilize the relationship with their brand."
Why plan your Instagram posts?
Nowadays, it is increasingly complicated to get known via your Instagram posts without first creating a digital strategy. Therefore, it is fundamental to know some important basics about this media if you want to grow your community without spending your life on the platform!
You will often see articles that talk about tools you can use to manage the scheduling of your Instagram postsIf you want to know more about Instagram, don't hesitate to consult our website which will guide you in the choice of your programming tool. Before that, we would like to explain to you why it is important to schedule your Instagram posts in advance if you are in a logic of long-term impact.
Within Flowr Agency, we mainly use the Later software when we work with our clients. Using a scheduling tool has many advantages.
The benefits of scheduling Instagram posts
Scheduling your Instagram posts has many benefits like:
- Create a harmonious feed that makes visitors want to stay on the page and subscribe
- Save time during the publication, because everything is done in advance without having to make any click on the moment thanks to the "auto-publish" option
- Follow up on downstream publications
- Publish your photos at the best time (see Instagram pro with statistics)
- Reach the audience at the best time (same as Instagram pro)
- Free up your time to focus on Instagram engagement
- Increase the reach of posts
- Work on more qualitative content and focus on the theme
- Be notified when you post and get feedback faster
- Create flow and relevance for subscribers by thinking about the medium and long term
Key 2: Instagram post engagement
Why is creating engagement on Instagram important?
A statistical study has shown that more than 70% of users who had a positive impression with a brand on social networks, recommends it to their friends and family. And good word of mouth is an excellent asset to increase your visibility.
How do you create engagement on Instagram?
Reply to comments :
- First, because all constructive criticism is good to take, both positive and negative. They help to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the company, and therefore to improve.
- Then, a customer relationship does not stop never to sales. Having a customer is good, keeping one is better. Responding to reviews is therefore an essential step in the buying process. Responding to customers significantly increases the retention rate.
- Finally, it creates content, and therefore once again, it strengthens the bond between the brand and the community.
Commenting on other posts on the same style of Instagram content also provides visibility for the brand.
Create surveys To make its community participate with surveys allows to take the temperature, to know a little the tendencies on certain subjects and thus to adapt if necessary.
It also generates activity and therefore engagement.
Why create a professional account on Instagram?
- Contact information : Instagram is, and is increasingly becoming, a preferred point of contact between consumers and brands. Indeed, using the platform has a series of advantages for users.
- The proximity : Instagram humanizes the dialogue. Indeed, it breaks down the walls. When you address someone on Instagram it feels like you're talking to a human. It's much more pleasant and natural than an after-sales service email box.
- The simplicity : The overwhelming majority of people use Instagram more than their email address. This allows users to centralize their information. Simplicity is always something consumers are looking for.
- Statistics : Almost 70% of active users on Instagram, get in touch with content creators at least once. In addition, nearly 46% of users surveyed prefer to get in touch with businesses via social networks, rather than through more "traditional" means like email. Finally, 2% of users only use Instagram to get in touch with companies
Key 3: Conversion rate
How do you increase the conversion rate on Instagram?
What is a conversion rate? It's the ratio of the number of visitors performing a desired action on a given platform to the total number of visitors or views. In other words, how many visitors bought a pair of shoes on your site compared to the total number of visitors who saw it.
In the end: (customers/visitors) *100= conversion rate
It is a key data to calculate the effectiveness of its actions. So, how to increase your conversion rate?
We will see in a first time how to optimize this rate through so-called organic actions, in other words through natural referencing.
Next, we will look at theuse of sponsor for Instagram content.
In fact, today you have to deal with both approaches, it is almost impossible to do without one of the two methods if you want to achieve your business objectives.
1) Determine your target audience
Before speaking, you must know who you are addressing. This is why it is important to identify your target. To do this, you must segment your market and select your core target. Once this is done, you must gather as much information as possible about their habits and characteristics. The relevance of your message depends on it.
2) Choose the appropriate tone
The way you tell your story is very important. You don't talk the same way to your banker as you do to your best friend. It's the same on Instagram, you need to go for the right tone, the one your audience will be most receptive with.
It is part of a whole, your brand image is no exception. If you've chosen a light and familiar tone. Your visuals can't be serious and "stilted". Consistency is key.
This will help people understand who you are as a brand and build trust between you and them. That way, when it comes time to buy, you'll be one of the options that matter.
If you're not sure how your brand should be expressed, analyze your visual identity (if it's well done) and your customer feedback, it may inspire you.
If you want to know more about the best practices to build a visual identity that works, feel free to take a look at our guide for this purpose!
3) Offer quality content
Put like that, it goes a little bit without saying. But you have to be aware that many companies neglect the quality of their Instagram posts. Yet, this network is the perfect platform to tell your story, it's too stupid not to use it.
Tell visual stories about your brand, if they are captivating or intriguing, users are going to be on board with what you are telling them through short Instagram posts.
Start creating visuals to tell engaging stories about your brand, yourself, your employees' experiences, or your brand's impact on customers. This is a key moment that will serve to dramatically increase your followers' Instagram engagement.
There is no need to remind you that the quality of a visual identity plays a huge role in the process of attachment to the brand and therefore in the buying process.
The visual content must therefore be neat and consistent. A blurry photo or a 360P video will give a sloppy image, and repel your prospects.
Si vous désirez en savoir comment obtenir des royalty-free images d’excellentes qualités, nous avons rédigé une liste qui va vous aider !
4) Use hashtags on Instagram
Hashtags are a great tool on Instagram. They allow your content to appear in search results for the aforementioned hashtags and on Explore pages for users who have interacted with content similar to yours.
Using hashtags is a great way to boost your content and brand visibility.
If you offer so-called niche content, this is an even more valuable tool. Using niche hashtags is going to be a shortcut that leads directly to your business page. It's really these hashtags that can allow you to reach your core target audience precisely.
On the other hand, if you choose the most used or general hashtags, you risk drowning in the gigantic flood of Instagram content.
By choosing hashtags that are relevant to what you have to offer, you greatly increase your chances of getting your brand in front of potential customers.
5) Have clear calls to action
Your bio creates traffic to your website, or any other desired destination. It is therefore important to take care of it.
You have to take care of it, because it's the first thing that the internet user sees. A few relevant sentences, as well as a nice Instagram profile picture are enough to put the visitor at ease and make them want to continue on your page.
Instagram allows you to insert links in your bio, you should use this option by putting links redirecting your viewers to your relevant pages. The pages that will move him forward in the sales funnel.
The call to action must be clear, and it must make the user want to go there.
They also need to be relevant. The consumer who clicks on a link to read an article about the relevance of Instagram does not want to be redirected to a page offering to buy crypto-currencies. Or simply a link that isn't up to date doesn't generate any more traffic, so that's leads foolishly lost.
Simply asking your followers to perform an action is effective. Be careful, it's not about giving an action, but simply signifying that it can be beneficial to perform an action. Like suggesting to a reader to learn more about a specific topic in another article of the site for example 🙂
Adding a notion of time with the use of terms like limited editions, in publications can be a call to action as well.
There are services such as Zapier or Buffer allowing you to create a link for your Instagram stories as well as a series of links for your bio. Best of all, this kind of app updates the links every time you change them.
It also calculates the number of clicks generated by each link in your bio so you can determine which ones work best for you.
6) Create Instagram contests
Running Instagram contests is a great way to boost engagement with your audience. Instagram sweepstakes will allow you to make your Followers win all sorts of things like: a copy of your new product, a month trial to your services, ...
So Instagram contests are a great way to achieve goals such as:
- Get more likes and comments
- Increase your audience's traffic to your website
- Increase the number of sales
Another benefit of running contests is that they increase your brand awareness. In general, users who participate will share the contest with their friends, family and followers in order to maximize their chances of winning.
This means that you will benefit from increased exposure on social media through a snowball effect, that you will be able to attract new potential customers who might not have heard of you before.
7) Sponsor the necessary Instagram content
Sponsored Instagram content are, as the name suggests, Instagram posts for which a company will allocate an advertising budget. The Instagram content in question is therefore going to be promoted by Instagram and thus reach a much larger audience.
Before we get into the nitty-gritty, it's important to remember that the tips for organic Instagram content still hold true.
On Instagram, there are two categories of sponsored content:
- Content that you pay Instagram directly for, otherwise known as boosted Instagram posts.
- Content for which third parties are paid, i.e. influencers
As for boosted Instagram posts: Instagram works like other major social networks (Facebook,TikTok, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.), Instagram uses a native ad management tool.
That is to say, companies create personalized target cores based on social, economic, demographic, etc. characteristics. In other words, age, gender, interests and location, habits.
Then, the sponsored content is delivered to these personalized targets.
When it comes to content relayed by influencers: a brand will pay a third party to promote the brand via Instagram.
Usually, this user (or influencer) has a certain number of followers. If a brand believes that the community that follows an influencer corresponds to its target, the work is somehow pre-chewed. The brand then proposes a partnership with the influencer in question.
Succeeding on Instagram: a breeze when you have all the keys!
Instagram is therefore an indispensable tool for any business that wants to have a successful communication strategy. For a successful Instagram strategy, you need to pay attention to:
- la régularité dans les posts Instagram
- Avoir un format video instagram adapté,
- the engagement you will create to animate your community by creating a link and proximity with your audience
- Take care of your strategy that will lead users to interact with your brand, and thus make Instagram a preferred acquisition channel
If you can implement all these tips, your Instagram communication will be successful.
Instagram is not only a visual platform to put a face on your brand, but also a place to engage with your audience, and where the interactions you have will put your brand in the spotlight.
What about you, what is your relationship with Instagram ❤️ or 💔? Tell us in the comments what works for you!
