Let’s assume you’ve already set up an Instagram Business account for your company or brand. You’ve got Instagram… but now what?
Unfortunately it’s a lot more involved than just posting a new photo every day. If you want your business to stand out on Instagram and gain recognition, exposure, and new clients, you need to fully utilise the platform. You need a strategy.
Luckily for you, our Melbourne digital marketing agency knows what it takes to succeed at the Instagram game – and no, it doesn’t involve shady tactics like buying followers.
Here are a few actionable Instagram tips that should help you get started:
Add Localised or Niche Hashtags
Hashtags are to Instagram what keywords are to SEO for websites: that is, VERY IMPORTANT in order to “get found” when users are searching for various topics online. Therefore, whenever you post on Instagram you should add relevant hashtags to it.
We know what you’re thinking: But how do I know which hashtags to use? Right? Well, glad you asked!
Start by searching for a hashtag that’s relevant to your post. Your search should pull up numerous tags similar to what you searched, along with how many times each has been used. The trick is to utilise hashtags that aren’t too frequently OR infrequently used, else your post will either get buried in a massive pile of images using the same tag, or it will never get seen because too few people are using it. Try to aim to use hashtags that have 1000-50,000 posts for maximum exposure.
In the above example, we searched for digital marketing which pulled up all exisiting Instagram hashtags starting with that phrase. That phrase has been used on over 4 million posts, so it’s not such a good idea to use it. But there are plenty of other similar phrases with a more reasonable number of posts that we might be able to use instead (e.g. #digitalmarketingstrategy, #digitalmarketingexpert).
Taking it a step further, you can click on any of the hashtags and it’ll bring up even more related tags which you can click on to find more and more tags to use, as well as images that are using the tag.
Note that best practise on Instagram is to add hashtags in a comment below your image post, rather than in the image caption.
Post Consistently and Timely
Gone are the days of posting to Instagram on a whim. Nope, if you want Instagram success, you must post regularly and preferably around the same time every day. Why? Because then your followers will know when to expect your posts, which helps build trust.
A good strategy is to post a new image whenever most of your followers are online and using Instagram. Thankfully there’s a handy little feature under Insights in the app that provides you with a few nifty stats about where your followers come from and which days and times they are most active on Instagram (see left image below). You can also see what sorts of posts are generating the most engagement (see right image below).
Knowing these bits of information will enable you to optimise both what you’re posting, and when, in order to maximise the number of people who see, like, comment, or start following you on Instagram.
STAY TUNED FOR PART 2 ON USING INSTAGRAM TO GROW YOUR BRAND – COMING SOON!