You can use Instagram to reach out to more than one billion potential customers and market your brand for free! Here are some marketing tips for successful e-commerce branding on Instagram.
1. Keep it Calm
Instagram has a laid-back layout and feed. So, make sure to keep your business account professional, while maintaining a welcoming, friendly vibe. Aim to make sure your posts are friendly in terms of their aesthetics and captions. Don’t scare away your potential customers by being too rigid or boring!
2. Don’t Push Your Brand
Even though branding is the main reason for your business account, try not to look too desperate to sell your product or service. Constantly posting pictures or videos of your product will not be helpful. Instead, promote your brand through subliminal cues that people are more receptive too.
3. Use the Right Pictures
Your Instagram profile needs to showcase your product or service in a creative way. Edit your images and videos in the right manner, keeping in line with a certain theme. Don’t overdo with filters and other tools. A natural-looking feed helps in building confidence and trust!
4. Keep Up with Trends
Use your Instagram account to keep tabs on the current hot topics and try to incorporate them into your marketing strategy. The ‘explore’ tab is a great way to keep up with trends and your competition. You should post your content with the aim of ending up on the ‘explore’ tab yourself.
5. Know Your Audience
Using opinion polls and the ‘ask a question’ feature will help you figure out what your audience is looking for and what they expect from your brand! You can also engage with your followers in the comments section. If they’re asking questions, reply and let them know that their opinion is being heard.
6. Use Relevant Hashtags
You can grow your business’s profile organically through hashtags. This is what makes Instagram such a great platform. Using generic hashtags would make your post get lost in a stream of a million or so other posts with the same hashtag! Use hashtags that are more local and familiar, such as the name of your particular service, and where you are located. Make sure you have a list of keywords that are central to your product and audience, and then use them frequently in your hashtags.
7. Do Not Spam
Posting 7-8 times a day is a big no. Some of your followers may get annoyed at the spam on their feed and unfollow your business account. Thus, for effective marketing, post a maximum of two times a day.
8. Utilize Your Bio Carefully
Getting your bio right is important for any Instagram page because it’s one of the first things your customer will see. Add details about your brand to your Instagram. For example, include the name, e-mail address, office address, and something about your service. If your brand has a website, make sure you link to that in the bio as well.
9. Have a Professional Profile Picture
Using your brand’s logo as a profile picture will make your page look professional. Your followers will also see the logo repeatedly; for example, it’ll be visible whenever you post content. By doing this, your logo will become familiar to your viewers. Use a high-quality image in your profile picture as a part of your marketing strategy!
10. Hire Professionals
Instagram marketing is a tricky business. You need to be up-to-date on every little thing, and you must be able to post at the right times of the day. If you miss the optimal posting times, you could be losing out on a lot of follower engagement. Thus, if your schedule doesn’t allow you to keep your business account in its best shape, you should consider hiring a social media manager and a photographer to fulfill the responsibility. The ROI on Instagram is fruitful for e-commerce marketers!
11. Be Responsive
You should attempt to interact with your audience directly on Instagram. If you don’t have the time to do so, hire a social media manager who can do it for you. Interacting with your audience makes your company look more ‘human.’ Instead of identifying your company as a huge corporation, your audience will begin to establish a relationship with you and may start to trust you more.
12. Get Verified
There are millions of accounts on Instagram, and it’s easy to get lost in a sea of company accounts. To stand out, you can get your account verified on Instagram by providing the required information. The blue tick is a great sales booster because it immediately establishes a sense of trust in the potential buyer. Audiences are more likely to buy from verified accounts because they know that it won’t be a scam.
13. CTA Buttons
Having potential customers visit your Instagram profile is great. However, to turn these visitors into customers, you need to do something more. We suggest that you use Call-To-Action buttons. Place them right underneath your bio to engage visitor’s activity.
14. Follow Other Brands
Follow other brands to:
Know their strategies. Build a reputation. Promote your brand.
15. Engage with Influencers
Influencers have a lot of sway in the online community. Their followers pay attention to what these influencers are using and promoting on their page. So, ask influencers to review, talk about, and promote your brand. Another great way to use influencers to promote your brand is through guest takeovers! You can ask an influencer to manage content on your Instagram, usually through the Stories feature, for a while. This will attract all of their followers to your page. Using the tips mentioned above can greatly help improve e-commerce branding on Instagram. Becoming a known name on Instagram is a sure way to gain new customers.