According to current research, 72% of customers purchase a product after seeing it on Instagram. They are hooked by the product’s visual representation that urges them to do so. In short, a single image can determine the audience’s consideration in moving on with a product.
Instagram was first designed to share beautiful imagery that people would love. Later, many companies begin to see the importance of influencer marketing on Instagram and leverage Instagram features to create emotionally-evoking visuals to attract their audience. After all, visual content on Instagram has been nothing but the biggest power in social media marketing campaigns.
However, the Instagram marketing strategy isn’t all about posting candid photos of your products or sharing unnecessary motivational quotes for the feed. It’s more than filtering photos here and there, and that’s key to your campaign success.
In this article, you’ll find a comprehensive strategy to use Instagram as a powerful marketing tool in 2022. Let’s dive in!
What is Instagram Strategy?
Instagram marketing refers to marketing efforts that involve Instagram. This social media channel allows a brand to connect with its target audience and grow brand awareness. In general, there are two primary marketing strategies on Instagram:
- Organic, which includes a post on Feed, Instagram Stories, Instagram TV, and Reels
- Paid Promotion, which includes Instagram Ads and marketing with content creators
As a starting point in involving Instagram in your marketing plan, make sure you have set up an Instagram business account or an Instagram Creator account.
The following are steps to switch your account into a business account:
- Open your Profile Page and tap the three-line at the top right
- Choose Setting, tap Account
- Select Switch to Professional Account and follow the on-screen instructions
Writing a well-crafted Instagram bio is the next step. To attract your ideal audience, keep it brief yet informative. Tell a bit about what your brand is all about.
Now, you are ready to meet your new audiences and make more people notice your presence.
Instagram Statistics Every Marketer Should Know in 2022
You cannot just rely on your intuition to outline a solid marketing plan. Statistics and data are your fuel to refine your targeting effort better and set your goal. You can notice who, how, and when people interact on the platform.
Thus, you can accurately predict what kinds of content will get more attention.
Here is a summary of Instagram statistics that may assist you in preparing and adjusting your plan accordingly:
- Instagram users spend an average of 30 minutes each day on the app.
- Every second, there are 995 new photos posted on Instagram.
- Around 354 million Instagram users are between the ages of 25 and 35.
- By 2023, the number of Instagram users in the United States is expected to reach 126 million.
- Every day, the Instagram story is used by over 500 million accounts.
- 130 million Instagram users click on a shopping post to learn more about products monthly, and 90% of Instagrammers follow at least one business account.
- Every day, almost 200 million people view one business profile.
- After seeing an ad on Instagram, more than half of consumers are interested in the brand.
- Posts with a location tag have a 79% better engagement rate.
- Businesses account for one-third of the most popular stories.
- User-generated content on Instagram gains a 4.5% higher conversion rate compared to other types of marketing content.
- For every $1 spent on influencer marketing, marketers may earn up to $5.20.
- On weekdays, particularly Wednesday and Thursday, users are more engaged with Instagram posts.
- Videos receive two times more engagement than photos on Instagram.
- A post from a business account had 0.96% engagement on average.
- A brand can reach 83 million youth audiences.
- Instagram stories ads with a highlighted call to action perform better 89%.
5 Instagram Post Ideas to Boost Your Engagement Rate
What makes people love Instagram is that it provides a ton of content with an eye-catching visual. If you want to capture attention, you need to create a high-quality photo or video to pique people’s interest in your account.
Always ensure it is crisp, well-composed, and well-lit. Create more interactive posts that will thrill your existing followers and encourage them to repost your content to liven up your account.
To understand which type of post would fit on your business better, first you have to know the Instagram explore page algorithm.
Need some ideas? Take a look at the following examples.
#1. Behind-the-scene posts
Build a personal level connection with your audience by using a behind-the-scenes post. Not only does it give a deeper understanding of your product, but the post also makes your customers feel more special.
The behind-the-scenes post may include fun facts about your product, manufacturing process, minor updates about your ongoing project, an inside look at your team, and others.
#2. User-Generated Content
User-generated content (UGC) is 9.8 more impactful than influencer content. The authentic testimony that comes from real people influences people’s purchasing decisions.
Just like a behind-the-scenes post, UGC also helps humanize your brand. The simplest way to get user-generated content is by actively reposting content from your customers. You can also offer some gifts to encourage your followers to make a post about your product.
For instance, consider a custom frame store sending wholesale picture frames to young artists for their art exhibitions. By doing so, they not only support emerging talents but also generate user-generated content showcasing their custom frames in front of their ideal target audience.
#3. How-to posts
How-to content is popular on all social media platforms, including Instagram. You can demonstrate step-by-step guides to use your product in a short video rather than post a photo with a lengthy caption explaining how the product works.
#4. Instagram challenge
If most of your audiences are Millennials and Gen Z, the Instagram challenge will lift your reach and engagement rate. Challenge content is fun, and young people love to get involved in this kind of content.
You can try some easy contests: comment to win, caption this photo, vote to win, and user-generated content.
#5. Interactive quiz and puzzle
Make your audience stop scrolling and see your post by uploading an interactive quiz or puzzle. You may use cute graphics and animation to make it more engaging.
You can also utilize the Instagram quiz feature on the Stories. Interactive Instagram Story can significantly boost engagement, and about 39% of users claim that this feature hooks them to engage with the brand.
How Can I Improve My Instagram Marketing Strategy in 2022?
Now, you’ve got some insight into how Instagram works for marketing in recent years. This platform has immense power to promote your brand, and the trend will keep growing in 2022.
A successful Instagram strategy begins with consistency. For the next year, the rule remains the same. It’s crucial to let your followers know about your presence by posting content regularly. Doing so will bring new followers and leads.
If you have started Instagram marketing this year and need to improve, read the following tips.
#1. Make your profile page more appealing
Optimize your profile to build a positive first impression. Create a well-crafted bio that conveys your brand personality. Don’t forget to pay attention to your name and username. Make sure your Instagram account is search-friendly.
Moreover, choose a profile picture or logo that represents your company. A profile photo on Instagram must be 110 by 110 pixels. You can also use 320 by 320 pixels measurement to ensure that the image still has good quality.
Don’t forget to add your website, business category, and call-to-action to encourage people to tap on the clickable link that you have provided. The link should redirect people to go to your promotion page, landing page, and so on.
#2. Establish your brand’s look
A study found that 60% of big brands have used the same filter for every post they made.
You can apply the same formula for your account by using consistent colors and similar themes for all contents. Thus, every piece of your post will be instantly recognizable.
People will judge your brand within 90 seconds after seeing it for the first time, and 90% of the judgment is influenced by color. Last but not least, color also affects purchasing decisions.
#3. Generate great captions
Instagram helps generate a caption for your visual content. Compelling Instagram captions are your brand voice so, make sure to put the essential information in the first two lines and tell other details in the rest.
This platform allows you to write 2,200 characters long in one post. However, using 125 characters for Instagram ads is enough. For organic posts, Hootsuite suggests writing 138 to 150 characters.
You can also add branded tags to the caption to boost your post performance. People will easily find your product and learn about your brand through the tags.
#4. Make the most of Instagram Story Highlights
After 24 hours, your Instagram Stories will disappear. Fortunately, Instagram has a Story Highlight feature that allows you to pin a unique story and showcase your product on your profile.
You can create some customized categories, such as your location, menu, testimonies, and many more. Use distinctive cover Story Highlights to make it more interesting.
#5. Interact with your audience and accounts that are similar to yours
You need to engage with the audience to improve your engagement rate. Build an interactive relationship with your followers by replying to their comments, hitting love on their replies, and even reposting the posts that tag you.
Interact with various accounts with similar niches to yours to make your brand more visible to your target viewers.
#6. Go live
Instagram Live isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. People adore brands that use Instagram Live because it allows them to interact with you in real-time. It presents a more human aspect of your company.
Longer live streams, according to Sprout Social, tend to attract a larger audience. You can go live for up to an hour but not less than ten minutes.
Promote your live stream on your Stories or Feeds before the due date to get more people to watch. It’s also fun to use a countdown clock in your Story to remind your followers about the live stream.
#7. Optimize some features from Instagram Business
Instagram Business includes a few more features to help you run your business. You can optimize each of them to increase your engagement and followers.
If you’re not yet familiar with all of the features, here’s a quick overview to get you started:
- Insights
It gives detailed demographic information as well as complete information on total impressions received. With Instagram Insights, you can analyze the data and determine which posts are the most successful.
- Contact Information
It shows beneath your profile picture. You need to include your email or phone number so that your customers may contact you.
- Quick Reply
It’s a feature that allows you to respond to some of your clients’ inquiries in a short time.
#8. Open an Instagram Shop
Thanks to Instagram because it generates a feature that allows people to buy products easily without leaving the app and drive product discovery. It displays some photos of your product and the price.
If people want to get detailed information about the product, they can read the description below the photo.
However, there are eligibility checkers to get approved for Instagram Shop. Your brand must sell a physical product, own an e-commerce website, comply with Facebook Merchant Agreement and Commerce Policies, and be located in one of Instagram Shop’s supported markets.
You may use Commerce Manager’s Catalog Manager for manual posting and uploading your product. You need to prepare the image, name, and description of the product beforehand.
You may also link your shop to the Commerce Manager and easily reuse your current catalog if your items are already displayed on one of Facebook’s e-commerce Platform Partners.
#9. Advertise on Instagram
It will take longer to significantly raise your followers if you merely rely on the organic method. Instagram Ads is a lucrative option if you want to expand your visibility to your target audience. This feature can reach nearly 850 million people and is projected to reach about 5.9% by 2021. Instagram Ads fits many needs, such as increasing brand awareness, gaining more clicks to your website, and improving sales.
Instagram ads also offer several formats, such as image ads, stories ads, video ads, carousel ads, explore ads, IGTV ads, shopping ads, collection ads, and reels ads.
Conclusion
Instagram marketing is not going anywhere anytime soon. This platform is still powerful enough to increase leads, grow brand awareness, and even raise sales based on the statistics. It generates some features that are helpful for marketers and business owners. Optimizing each feature is the key to gaining more revenue.
Try different content types to encourage people to engage with your accounts and optimize your profile page to invite more new followers. Moreover, writing great captions, creating Instagram Story Highlights, and going live is necessary to make your account stand out.
