It's no secret that Instagram has been making tidal waves in the world of social media marketing.  In 2012, Facebook purchased the service for $1 billion. According to Instagram, the social platform has "more than 300 million daily active users and 500 million monthly users." If your business is not using the platform to grow your brand, you're certainly missing out on a massive marketplace. How do I post? What do people want to see? Can I share other users content? Continue reading to learn some simple Instagram marketing tips to improve your strategy. 

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1. Free Instagram Marketing Tools

Instagram's platform allows users to create two different types of profiles. You may create a personal Instagram account, or a business profile. While a personal profile leaves you with all of the standard options to post, share, like other users posts and comment, upgrading to a business profile unlocks a handful of free Instagram marketing tools that will help you monitor your growth. Instagram business profiles provide you with the following insights:

• Impressions: Total number of times your post or story was seen
• Reach: Number of unique accounts who saw your post or story
• Website Clicks: Number of accounts that have tapped the website link on your Business Profile
• Follower Activity: Average times your followers are on Instagram on a typical day
• Video Views: Number of times your video was viewed for 3 or more seconds
• Saves: The number of unique accounts that saved your post

A business profile will also allow you to use their ad systems (operated through Facebook) to created targeted ads promoted to an audience of your choice. You can learn more about the ads system here. If you're wondering how to convert your personal page into a business account, click here.

2. Publish Quality Content

Instagram is based around sharing visual content. If you take a look through some of your personal favorite or most post popular accounts that you follow, you will see high quality content and photos be published. With hundreds of millions of Instagram users exploring all pieces of the app on a daily basis, strong and high quality imagery is going to allow your Instagram marketing strategy to shine it's brightest.

Here's a couple great examples! (We're really big on some great food!)

Bears Smokehouse never lets us down! You can follow them on Instagram, here.

CT Food Lovers is an account that has guided us all across Connecticut eating the BEST foods! Check them out!

Both of these Connecticut food staples share some beautiful, tasty content. Checking out their feeds will allow you to pull some great Instagram marketing tips for your own business as well!

3. How Do I Get Discovered On Instagram?

Unfortunately, simply creating an account and kicking back is not going to cut it. Quality followers don't just appear! The team over at Sprout Social put together these Instagram marketing tips on how to be more likely to get discovered:

• Instagram’s explore features: One of the most popular features on Instagram is Explore. This helps people find users or posts their own followers liked, followed or commented on. This opens a floodgate of content and you should try to get there by being where your future audience expects you.
• Tag People Involved: If there’s anyone participating in your campaign, make sure to tag them in your posts. Additionally, if you use USG content, give the person an appropriate shoutout. Using @mentions can actually double your engagement. This sparks a chain of events for friends of friends to notice your content.
• Use Hashtags Often: Instagram hashtags are your best friend. Hashtags help you get discovered, archive content and participate with other trending topics. Branded hashtags can do wonders for your marketing strategy.
• Use Geo Locations: Instagram users use geo locations to find content tagged at that specific location. Always use your geo-tag features from wherever you’re posting to boost your audience’s size. For example, if you were debating on where to eat and wanted to see authentic images of the food and decor, search a restaurant’s geo tag. Here you can see the arrange of posts and videos for the restaurant Sink/Swim. (Source)

 Hopefully, you have found the above Instagram marketing tips useful! If you're new to the platform, or revamping your content strategy, drop us a comment and let us know how these work out for you as well as some of your favorite tips and tricks! If you have an IG account that we need to see, tag your handle as well!

Imageworks,LLC | Social Media Marketing CT

From restaurants to manufacturers, our team at ImageWorks,LLC., has experience in creating, growing, and managing social media accounts in a widespread variety of industries. It's our mission to stay up to date on the latest social gadgets and platforms helping us provide prominent ROI and a next- level tier of customer service and engagement for all of our customers!