Instagram is a fun and quirky way to share your life with friends through a series of pictures. Snap a photo with your mobile phone, then choose a filter to transform the image into a memory to keep around forever. We’re building Instagram to allow you to experience moments in your friends’ lives through pictures as they happen. We imagine a world more connected through photos – as defined on Instagram’s website.
Since its acquisition by Facebook, Instagram has grown to become one of the most loved social media platforms with a total of 200 million users, and has become one of the highest engagement social media platform with an engagement rate 15X that of Facebook’s! Source: L2 Think Tank’s Report.
With such an impressive stats, it’s no wonder that brands are flocking to Instagram to connect with the audience and here are 5 tips to help you along the way.
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Hashtag everything!
Instagram is a social discovery platform. People go looking at OOTDs (Outfit Of The Day) to search for inspiration for their next shopping trip. To look at stunning, breathtaking photos of the world where they have never set foot on. Or to even experience an event from the unique perspective of others.
All of these are made possible through hashtags; users of Instagram often search through hashtags to find beautiful photos relevant to them, and here are 2 tips how you can take advantage of this fact!
Firstly, make use of the “100 Most Popular Hashtags” information on Webstagram, find the ones that are relevant to your brand or to the photos that you are posting. Avoid hijacking a particular hashtag just because it’s popular (it’s only going to come across as spam-y and annoying).
Secondly, a report by TrackMaven shows us how many hashtags should we use for maximum effect and engagement on Instagram.
If you have less than 1000 followers, use 5 to 11 Hashtags for maximum engagement on Instagram as this allows your brand to be discovered easily by others who may share the same passion or interest.
However, once you have reached more than 1000 followers, use about 4-5 Hashtags to prevent being come across as spam-y.
Tap on the creativity of your fans
One of the best forms of interaction with Instagram’s audience is to actively seek out users who are making beautiful artwork/photo with your products and re-post them onto your brand’s Instagram page.
Starbucks, Glass Dharma and Sharpie have done this perfectly. Go to their Instagram page and see how they are giving your audience their own one minute of fame.
This is a great way to interact with your fans as it shows your appreciation of their creativity using your products and encourages them to flaunt their creativity even further.
Unfortunately, the native Instagram app still doesn’t allow for re-posting, so here are a few tools to help you along the way.
Differentiate your Instagram from your other social networks
Post original content that can’t be found on your other social networks to give your fans an incentive to follow you on Instagram. Though you can spread your goodwill on Instagram to other social networks by posting some really good artworks to other social networks too.
Instagram photo with faces gets more interactions
A research by Georgia Institute of Technology and Yahoo Labs shows that Instagram photos with Faces are 38% more likely to get likes and 32% more likely to get comments.
One great way to take advantage of this fact is to hold a photo contest; ask your customers to post photos of themselves using your products on Instagram. This help to increase your brand’s reach and exposure to the networks of your participants.
Mix It Up
Since the launch of Instagram videos, there has been a 37% increase in the number of Instagram shares on Twitter – Source: Buzzfork
Since the debut of Instagram video, it has been well received by its audience. A video shows more details of the happenings, and at the same time allows capturing of emotions that can help tell your story better.
This is also aided by the flawlessness of playing video on the Instagram app. So do take advantage of this and give your fans some surprise!
So what do you think? Should Instagram become an important aspect of every brand’s social media marketing strategy? Tell me in the comments below!