How to use Instagram for business

With more than 500 million active accounts and 4.2 billion daily likes, Instagram is the picture powerhouse your business needs to be on.

The vamped up visual cousin of Facebook, Instagram has the power of pictures to move people and inspire potential customers to see your business in a different light. Learn how to get your business on Instagram with our quick guide below, as well as some best practice tips.

Let’s get your account set up!

Account name

Firstly you need a name. Make it easy to search for so go with something simple such as your company name or an abbreviation.

Profile Photo

Use your business logo or something that represents you. Remember Instagram crops this photo into a 150 x 150 pixel circle image.

Text

Consider the length of your captions, for example think of what your audience prefers. Test it out and look to others for best practice and tips. Many prolific Instagrammers utilise text to stand out even more, with double spacing, capitals or asterisks to look like headers.

Hashtags

Hashtags make it easier for non-followers to find you as users can search for hashtags of relevance to them. Therefore, use hashtags that are linked to your photo or business, and don’t go overkill. Too many and you’ll look spammy and will take away from the image.

Photos & Videos

Remember, Instagram is a community built on the power of visual storytelling. Use good quality photos and videos that help your business tell it’s story. Take advantage of all the amazing photo editing options and see what you can create!

Promoted posts

Instagram offers users the ability to boost posts. So you can turn well-performing posts into adverts within your app, and you’ll also have access to analytics to discover how the ad/post performed. Once you’ve shared a post, you can promote and choose a business objective. These can be to drive people to your website, phone or visit your shop for example. Choose your objective and confirm your call to action. Instagram can suggest who to target your campaign to or you can select who you want to target from a number of options, including age, interests, locations etc. Then simply set your budget and length of campaign. View your insights to see how it does.

6 tips on using Instagram

Visit the Instagram for Business blog which Instagram runs. It has plenty of inspiration and case studies on how to use it, as well as all the latest news on the social platform.

Make sure your images reflect who you are. Some businesses won’t allow guest Instagrammers or takeovers, and it’s because they want to stay in control of their branding. Balance your images with a nice mix of business and play if that is what your company is like. Cute puppy pics and corporate meetings can be good neighbours on Instagram.

Like users’ posts and follow back followers. Sounds obvious, but social media is a two-way street. Reach out to others, and they’re likely to reciprocate. You can also find like-minded businesses this way with hashtag searches, and you might even end up collaborating.

Post regularly. Again, don’t get spammy, but have a regular presence on Instagram and track what post times and days work well for you.

Use inspiring images. Customers want to feel like what you’re showing them is achievable, so make sure your images are simple but beautiful. Post photos relevant and representative of your core values.

Leverage hashtags that one step further by holding photo competitions with hashtags used as a way to organise submissions.

Let us know your tips in the comments below, and remember to give us a follow: @printedcom