Using Instagram for Business: Get Leads, Customers and More Sales

Wondering how to rapidly grow an Instagram page?
Instagram has 300 million active users  every month who like 3.5 billion photos every day. What makes Instagram a tactical business tool is the fact that it uses photos. Photos have a visual appeal and they pretty much market themselves. You do not need to create specific pushy advertisements.
instagram for business

The Top Instagram for Business Tips

By posting the right kind of content you can have tremendous marketing on Instagram. For instance, you can try to post Instagram story ads to gain engagement. Let us see how.

Step 1: Utilize Link in Bio

The goal, when it comes to Instagram for business, is to take people away from Instagram to a landing page, or website.  It’s the internet and you need to spell it out. Adding your link in your bio doesn’t make you redundant. The link should take users to the page where they find the same posts which got them interested. They shouldn’t have to look for those all over again on your website – that just kills their interest.
99% of people use insta on phone so any traffic that you drive has to be mobile ready. Make sure that your website is optimized for a mobile platform.
Additionally, make sure that you don’t post a long url of the landing page. Use a link shortener because that will also give you the data analytics on the traffic being diverted to your website from Instagram. Every time you post something new, use a different link so that you can keep a track of traffic leads.

Step 2: Epic Content Strategy

What is Instagram for business without the right content strtategy? Post consistently on a daily basis. An average Instagram account posts at least once a day, and successful one does more than that which on average is about 2-3 posts a day. Posting more than that will saturate your followers’ feeds and turn them off. Make a schedule and post often.
The best thing to do is post during popular times. Do a little research and post during the times when people are most active so that you will optimally reach the followers. The timing of the posts needs to be very strategic especially when it comes to videos. The follower needs to be available to watch the video. For example, nobody will watch a video during their work hours.
Instagram is all about its visual appeal and the photos that you post must have a good look. There is a reason why Instagram has all those filters. Using the right ones will get you more views and engagement by making your pictures standout.
Instagram is not a direct market. If your photos have to have the appeal that will make followers stick around you will need to inject a little charm into them and you can do that by creating lifestyle photos. Use real backgrounds with your product in use.
Tools: Wordsswag, Typorama, Kik, Canva.
Look to find the best possible content.
It doesn’t hurt to stay abreast of your competition if you want to succeed with Instagram for business.  INK361.COM (allows you to run scans on competitors accounts, so can find the most liked/commented. When you get the data on what has worked best for your competition, it gives you an easy insight as to what are the trends and appeal factors in your niche and you can use similar strategies instead of re-inventing the wheel.
If physical based product post photos of people utilizing product or service (for social proof). Using photos of real life people instead of models makes your approach authentic and gives your product way more credibility. Moreover, it increases brand loyalty, the person whose photos you used will himself want to market your product more. But make sure you get their permission before you use their photos.
Use a strong call to action in your bio or comments directing people to make a purchase. Be creative and inviting with your CTA. People won’t click on link in bio unless you ask them to. It’s what will help you in your Instagram for business success story.

Step 3: Hashtags for Instagram for business

Post relevant hashtags to niche or market. They are an important search tool for users to find stuff they are interested in. use relevant hashtags that include your brand name and product. Don’t make them too lengthy rendering them unreadable. You can also use hashtags of trending topics if they are relevant to your niche. Do not use more than 5 hashtags.
Get your audience engaged by using relevant hashtags that are relevant to your brand and your current campaign.
Engage with people in your target audience. Every good relationship is built on a two way communication. When users respond, so should you. Make sure you reply to their comments. If they have posted a photo of your product, thank them and like the picture. People love attention – make sure you are giving them enough.
Using the right hashtags can increase the engagement of your brand in leaps and bounds. They give you the opportunity to reach more people and for people to find you. Use tools such as Talkwalker to find out what hashtags your competition is using and monitor your campaigns. It’s going to help you in your Instagram for business journey.
instagram for business

Step 4: Shoutouts

Get as many people as possibly on Instagram to share your content. But for that, you will first need to have a loyal following. Create interesting content and ask people to share it. Another way to do this is by creating contests where followers stand a chance to win a goodie when they share your content or tag a friend. Connect your Instagram account to your Facebook page and have users share the content so that you will have a better outreach across another social media platform as well.
Share for share (s4s) or paid influencer marketing is a strong cross-promotional tactic. Share the content posted by other players in your niche and tag them, ask them to do the same for you. It helps create brand awareness and gets you good exposure.
Another way of using paid influencer shout-outs is to ask a influencer who has a large following to promote your product or service.
S4S get people to mention you in the content. Share the content where people mention you and give the user credits for it. To get people to mention you in their content you can also host a photo contest.

Step 5: Analytics

Track the most engaged images, how fast the account is growing, and test your shoutouts. Instagram itself has tools that will give you insights about user engagement. You can get information about which demographic your followers belong to and what kind of posts seem to best resonate with them. This helps you learn the user behavior and you can come up with strategies which are more relevant. Analytics tools will tell you about engagement through demographics  and based on time.
You also get to know how much you are being mentioned and track your sales. Use these tools to gain better insights, predict engagement, find influencers,  see what kind of content gets most engagement and use these insights to gain an edge over your competition.

Tools:

Iconosquare.com : it is the most popular analytics tool which gives you high-level and in-depth insights about user engagement.  Using this tool you can also add a Instagram tab on your facebook page for cross-channel engagement. Its embed feature allows you to showcase your photo gallery from your website.
Socialblade.com gives you complete insights on your Instagram activity like your followers, pictures you have uploaded, daily averages etc which you can use to create a strategy for growing your handle.
Minter.io : this tool gives you demographic details of your audience which you can use for growth and engagement. You can also track the growth in your target audience over time and see what kind of content gets more engagement.
Socialrank.com : this tool gives you insights using a follow centric service. It sorts and filters followers using various criteria. This data will help you understand what your users want and help you create strategies for the future.