How to create an Instagram Business Account
For creating an Instagram business account, you need to have an active Facebook business page. For creating one of those, go to the “create” tab at the top right and select the “page” option, then select the “Business or Brand” page option and create your Facebook business page.
Once that’s settled, go to your Instagram account and select “Switch to the business account.” And make sure your profile is set to “public” and is not a private profile.
How to Improve Your Instagram Profile
Choose a profile name that represents your brand properly.
Redact an appealing bio to tell your story and display your brand to potential clients.
Include a link to your website in said bio. And also endorse your patented hashtag, if you already have one.
Pick a suitable, high-quality profile picture that characterizes your brand.
Opt for a color palette or brand aesthetic for your posts and use it constantly.
Influence All Types of Instagram Content Formats
Instagram Stories
Instagram Stories are an entertaining way for brands to bond with their public and the content you can post as Stories can be:
Craft quizzes and polls.
Post Instagram Stories Ads with links for sale.
Ask a question.
Sponsor a giveaway or contest.
Show your achievements.
Now, your Instagram Stories will be accessible only to your followers, but ads can be directed to a much wider audience. The format stays the same, but the scope grows.
Highlights
Instagram Highlights are just Instagram Stories that you can keep attached at the top of your feed, for them to remain in a permanent exhibit.
Some of how you can use Instagram Highlights are:
For FAQs.
To present product collections/categories.
To put on show hacks, recipes, tutorials, and tips.
To show pictures and videos from brand events.
To publicize new product launches.
IGTV
Instagram TV is a feature that lets you post longer videos than those held by Instagram posts or Stories.
How to Create an IGTV Channel
Click on the IGTV logo at the top right of your Instagram feed.
Click on the apparatus icon.
Click on “create a channel” and follow the on-screen goads to create your IGTV channel.
How to Post IGTV Videos
Once you have generated your channel, you can merely click on the IGTV icon at the top right of your feed and then the plus icon to begin adding videos from your phone’s gallery, which can be:
Tutorial videos explaining product features and uses.
Q&A or AMA sessions.
Showcase customer testimonials or success stories to provide social proof.
Host a regular IGTV show similar to a TV show.
Instagram Live
Employing this helpful feature, you can stream live videos that will appear in your Instagram Stories.
Use Hashtags to Boost Your Campaigns
Hashtags are Instagram’s engine, and for promoting your content you can either apply the trending hashtags or you can create your brand’s hashtag
The benefit of doing the latter is that you can use just one hashtag to sponsor all types of content across Instagram.
When coming up with your brand’s hashtag make sure to:
Make it short and easy to remember.
Maintain it relevant to a definite campaign or original for your brand.
Use the hashtag for all your Instagram content related to that brand or campaign
Request for your audience to use that hashtag when reposting or sharing any of your content or participating in your contests.
Collaborate With Influencers
You can find relevant influencers by manual search or using influencer-search tools like BuzzSumo, Traackr, and BuzzStream.
Create Content That Stands Out
Instagram is no short on brands, marketers, and influencers so you have to make your content unique in any way you can!
Employ high-quality stock images for coming up with visually-attractive posts.
Keep all of your images and videos high quality.
Try different formats like images, videos, gifs, memes, Boomerang videos, etc.
Post at the right times, if possible during the day time on weekdays, to get as many views as possible.
Post content that is valuable and pertinent to your audience.
Pull User-Generated Content
Generating new and pertinent content regularly is hard, o user-generated content is your best bet. It lets you not only involve your audience but also offers you a steady stream of content to post.
Here are some ways in which you can employ user-generated content to your benefit:
Recompense your existing users by featuring their pictures of themselves using your product on your Instagram feed.
Ask your audience to tag your brand or use your hashtag to get a chance to be featured on your Instagram feed.
Repost user-generated content applicable to your brand and give recognition to the initial creators of the posts.
Evaluate Your Performance
After you have applied your marketing creativities and have run your campaigns, you need to calculate how well they performed.
You can determine the performance of your Instagram marketing campaigns either by using Instagram’s built-in analytics feature or third-party tools. All business accounts on Instagram have a built-in insights feature that delivers data on basic performance metrics. And if you want more innovative analytics to evaluate your performance, not only of your Instagram account, but specific campaigns, then you can use analytics tools like Iconosquare for insights on your Instagram account and content’s performance, Quintly for insights into your followers and competitors profiles, and Minter.io for telling which posts resound the best with your audience and why.