How To Use Instagram For Business
With over 400 million active users, 90% of which are under 35, Instagram cannot be ignored. It is one of the best ways to reach Millennials in today’s competitive marketing world. With so many Instagram accounts, how do we, as marketing experts break through the noise? Three things. Content, creativity, and consistency.
Content
Instagram is more than just amazing pictures and perfect filters. Those images need to come from a well thought out concept. You need to determine how you want the look and feel of your account to be, and then start working on your content from there. A content calendar is recommended to help you lay out your content for the month or quarter. By doing this, you will be able to see the big picture and overall plan for your account and make changes easily.
Questions to help you get started on content creation:
What are my goals for Instagram?
Will I show company culture?
How will I showcase my product or service?
How will I connect with my target audience?
Creativity
Think Instagram is only for ‘cool’ brands and products? FedEx‘s Instagram account is proving that wrong. Their creative content strategy includes tapping into their audience to entice user-generated content.
Creativity can be in the form of out-of-the-box thinking, engaging images, trending hashtags or story-telling bios
Consistency
You’ve heard it before, “consistency is key;” and that holds true for Instagram. When someone looks at your account as a whole you want them to get a feel for what your brand represents and what you are about. If your images, filters, and point of view are not consistent, visitors will not get a good first impression of your brand.
To stay consistent with your Instagram account, we suggest creating a style guide. This way, no matter who works on your account, there will be guidelines to make sure the appearance is always the same.
As you can see here Suja Juice typically has bright posts, with light backgrounds that give the account a bright and happy appearance. If they were to post an image with a darker background or dull filter, you would definitely notice the inconsistency.
