If you want to help your clients with their social media marketing, you need to add Instagram to your toolset. In general, social media has given business owners and consumers a new way to connect, share information, and to get deeper insight into a company. Specifically, many small businesses benefit from engaging with their customers (and potential customers) through Instagram.
A good Instagram strategy will reach new audiences, build credibility, and connect with consumers. Many business owners make the mistake of not being intentional with their content, which causes them not to grow. In order to build an audience on Instagram in particular, you need to strategize.
Instagram's algorithm favors consistency, video content, and high-engagement. If you want to know how to create engaging and valuable content, keep reading.
- Use Hashtags
One of the best and most important tools to boost your reach on Instagram is through the use of hashtags. Hashtags are a great way to categorize your posts so that they can be easily found. Without hashtags, people outside your current audience will never find your posts, and your following won’t grow.
You want your posts to reach as many people as possible, and hashtags are the easiest way to do that. Hashtags are basically free advertisement—so use them! When adding hashtags to a post, it’s important to be as niche as possible.
You don’t want to throw random hashtags on a photo, or add too many. The more nuanced you are, the more likely you are to reach people. Instead of putting generic and overused words like “#business,” use something specific to the post.
If there’s a macbook in the picture, add a hashtag for it. If you’re trying to sell tickets to a conference, add hashtags relevant to that conference. The more basic hashtags you put on a photo, the more likely it is to drown in all of the other photos on that thread. Get niched, and you’ll get more reach!
- Be Consistent
Instagram favors people who favor the platform. The more you post to your feed, stories, reels, or IGTV, the more instagram pushes your content to people. This doesn’t mean you have to use all of them every day, but be methodical with what you use.
In order to get the best results, you should be posting to stories at least once a day, to feed three times a week, and to reels or IGTV once a week. This will help you keep your audience engaged, reach new people, and will boost your posts to ensure your audience sees them.
- Boost Your Posts
Boosting posts is a new tool that Instagram recently added for business accounts. As you create content for clients, make sure your account is set to “business.” This gives you access to data and other insights that other accounts don’t have.
This also gives you the option to “boost” posts if you want them to cycle longer, reach more people, or get more data. “Boosting” a post works in a similar way to Facebook ads. The creator gets the option to create their budget to run a campaign for whatever duration of time they choose.
Often times, it’s best to boost a post that has already gotten a lot of engagement because that means more people will interact with this post. If you want to reach more people on Instagram or drive traffic to your website, boosting posts is the best way to do it.
- Add Value To Your Audience
The most important thing to consider when posting is, “What will my audience get out of this?” Creating content your audience wants to save and share enhances your reach. The more your audience shares your post, the more people it reaches. Alongside that, the more your audience saves your post, the more Instagram shares your content with others.
The more value the offer, the more engagement, trust, and revenue you’ll get in return. You want your audience to feel a connection with you. The best way to do that is by sharing educational, inspiring, or helpful content.
- Create Video Content
Once a photo-focused platform, Instagram recently invested $1 billion into increasing their video content. That means Instagram is pushing video content to their viewers harder than any other medium. If you truly want to build your reach on instagram, start creating video content.
This means posting videos on your feed, reels, and IGTV. The more videos you post, the more likely you are to build your audience. Focus on creating video-oriented content that can be reused on other platforms as well: Facebook, Youtube, or Clubhouse. The more platforms you have, the more people you can funnel back to your client’s business.
Social media is now more crucial than ever to growing your business. If you want to expand your reach, increase your engagement, and boost your sales, start utilizing all of Instagram's tools.
