Getting Started on Instagram as a Brand

When considering today’s best marketing platforms, Instagram is in the top three for sure. Users of the platform don’t shy away from following brands and businesses, and the new marketplace feature opens new opportunities for the world of retail work and other e-commerce brands.

Photo by Alexander Shatov on Unsplash

Furthermore, these features aren’t just there for show. Users actually engage with ads and purchase items and services directly from Instagram without hesitation. And most experts believe that the standing of Instagram will only become better in the next 5 years.

So apart from being a wise marketing medium today, your presence on the platform is also a great investment for the future! This article will teach you how to create and boost an Instagram account for business.

Create a Business Account

The first thing you must do when thinking of starting out on Instagram is creating a business account. A lot of people consider using their personal accounts as their business persona, but Instagram has added a lot of new features into their arsenal when it comes to business accounts, and these features should be taken advantage of by all.

These are Insights, Ads, Shopping, secondary inboxes, and more. Using a creator account helps overlook the actions in your business, and also helps to handle most setbacks and challenges. This is easily the most important thing you should know when trying to advertise through Instagram.

Define Your Goals

Every business should have a well-put-together marketing strategy that spans years if not decades. If you plan on giving Instagram a go, this strategy should include the platform, or you should have a strategy only for Instagram as a whole.

Because at the end of the day, all social media platforms are tools, and you need to understand how they work, and most importantly, what it is that you’re trying to build with them. A good marketing strategy includes both of these factors.

It defines the tools that you use, and the future you’re trying to build and creates a plan that tells you how exactly you can put two and two together in the most effective way possible.

You can use Instagram for various things. You can use it to create an online presence, or a social buzz for your company. You can raise brand awareness. You can also gather a lot of important information about your customers and competitions, or you can sell your products through the app.

These are just some of the many things you can use this tool for, and before getting started, it’s very important to pinpoint your goals to understand how to use the platform in your case. Without knowing where you want to end up, Instagram (or any other social media platform for that matter) becomes a maze, and you’re more unlikely to get from point A to point B quickly and effectively.

Know Your Audience

Anyone creating a marketing strategy needs to know who they’re speaking to. Ultimately, social media platforms are amazing for building deeper connections with your audience, which will lead to you getting to know your demographic. But even before that happens, you need to know your target audience.

A little research can help you figure out who your product or service speaks to most, and this will help you identify what you can and should use Instagram for. For example, most active users of the platform are between 18 and 30 years old, they mostly live in urban areas, and most of the users are American.

This doesn’t mean that you can’t ever find a 40-year-old European city dweller on the site, but it helps narrow down whose attention you will grab first. And this can be of great assistance when creating your social foundations on the app.

Because when you’re expanding to new areas, it’s not only important who you’re targeting, but also who is there currently who will possibly listen! All of this information will help you when choosing a target audience in the app.

Be Visually Compelling

Photo by Maddi Bazzocco on Unsplash

Instagram is a visual platform. The only thing other than the visual aspect of the app is the little text you can write under your photos. This means that your photo posts need to look amazing and need to be coherent throughout your platform.

When scrolling through the app, your followers should be able to recognize you by only glancing at your photos. People can identify most of their favorite brands by photo style alone because their eyes get used to the feeling of their content. And while you don’t need professional equipment, a sharp look, good lighting, good composition, and focus are the bare minimum when it comes to Instagram content.

The content behind the photos needs to be compelling as well. So as a viewer, it’s not enough for a photo to catch your attention because of the quality and colors, but it’s also just as important for the story, or the little text below it to tell you a story and keep you engaged throughout this experience.

A fairly new feature that came to Instagram a few years ago are IGTV videos, and Instagram Reels, which complete the range of video contents. Now, instead of 10-second story videos and live videos, you can take advantage of these new features to create more content.

It’s important for your image that your content looks coherent and consistent throughout all of your posts. This not only helps followers recognize your feed but also makes you look more compelling for new arrivals. A consistent color scheme, style, or feel can help you a lot in the long run.

Other than these, engaging your audience, being constantly active, and utilizing all of the mediums offered by the app can create the foundations for your brand’s image even before starting to advertise through the platform.

All of these can be done without financial investments and can amp up your image by reaching a wider audience. Additionally, the entire world of marketing is leaning towards an exclusively visual medium, and Instagram is the best gateway drug into that world.