Are you looking for ways to grow your business? It does not matter if you are a novice or a veteran; if you are a brand, you already know the importance of social media marketing in 2021. Social media as we know it today is already chock-a-block with several platforms. Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, YouTube, and Facebook are some of the most prominent among these. But if you want the verdict on which one is the most popular platform of them all, the answer is Instagram.
Instagram has been one of the most preferred social platforms ever since its inception in 2010. Over the years, the site has found its popularity growing among business and personal account holders alike. Today it is a social media giant and the most trending site to be in. If you wonder why this article compiles some of the most compelling reasons we can think of.
Most Businesses Prefer Instagram to Other Social Media Sites Because:
1. Instagram has a Large User Pool
For any business to succeed, it needs collaborators and consumers. Instagram today has over a billion users. That is a massive audience network to tap into! What is more, this user pool is demographically spread out, diverse in age, race, gender, and consumer preferences. For businesses on a tight budget, Instagram’s organic network of users is one of the most cost-effective mediums to grow itself. For others, acquiring followers on Instagram with no budget can also be effectively carried out thanks to the ever-increasing size of real Instagram users.
The very size of Instagram users gives businesses the perfect opportunity to:
- Reach a wider target audience;
- Grow brand consciousness among diverse consumer pools;
- Build a wider range of business connections;
- Connect with other businesses in its niche;
- Connect with a larger range of influencers and collaborators to team up with to enhance the company’s brand building and marketing strategies;
- Build themselves up as part of a community, even as they compete for sales and leads with like brands.
The biggest reason for this popularity of Instagram is the mobile-friendly user interface of the site. Most of the online user traffic these days comes from mobile devices, and Instagram has successfully tapped into this user market ever since its inception. Therefore, businesses looking to capture the attention of the tech-savvy population should find this itself the most convincing reason for creating a presence on Instagram for themselves.
2. Instagram provides the convenience of Several Advertising Tools
Instagram is no longer the mobile-phone photo-sharing app it started as. It has grown to include so many more features and benefits that businesses simply cannot ignore the platform. For several brands, it is a hot favorite platform for its promotional features. As a primarily visual site, the power of good quality visuals -both in terms of photographs and videos cannot be ignored by any brand seeking to build up its consumer pool. You can utilize this well by optimizing your Instagram marketing strategies with the right combination of visuals, hashtags, and keyword-enriched captioning. Most brands can reach their target consumers as well as collaborators using soft advertising features like:
- Stories
Authentic and honest Stories capture audience attention better than traditional advertising. Although Instagram Stories “disappear” 24 hours after being posted, this feature operated on a separate algorithm from the usual post feed. This enables businesses to push up their visibility and reach their target audience with a higher success rate than regular posts. Moreover, Stories can be bookmarked into “Highlights” to make them last on the platform for longer than 24 hours when required. Brands can cost-effectively use Stories to:
- Provide teasers of upcoming products, services, and events.
- Create notices for highlighting important dates, times, and announcements.
- Engage their audience in quick polls and surveys to collect consumer feedback or preferences.
- Direct audience to clickable links to important web pages, like posts on another social media platform, e-converse sites, homepage, mailing list forms, online questionnaires, and so on.
- Humanize the business by creating opportunities for one-to-one conversations with existing and potential consumers.
- Go live and provide raw, unedited content to followers as and when needed, as per marketing strategy.
- Reels
A fun Tik Tok-like short video feature, Reels allow Businesses to create micro ads in unique and crew ways that can immensely raise the brand’s popularity levels. Reels work great when your audience is pressed for time and wants to get full information in the shortest time possible. With just 15 seconds of air time, reels indeed are the quickest way to get your message across using music, movement, and creativity. As with any great advertising, although reels are short of creating, you may need to spend some time conceptualizing what content you want to place on your Reels to maximize audience engagement. Brands are increasingly drawn towards reels because:
- Unlike Instagram Stories, Reels are stored permanently (unless you choose to delete them) in a separate content category.
- They provide information in the shortest time possible.
- They are discoverable through Instagram’s Explore tab.
- You can self-share your Reels to your grid and Story, thus making it reach a wider audience.
- Instagram enables you to create retargeting audiences from viewers who have played your Reels. This gives you the advantage of tapping into look-alike audiences to widen your consumer base.
In addition to regular posts, brands are also able to create hard advertising avenues using:
- IGTV
This long-form immersive video feature allows you to create content ranging from 60 seconds to 60 minutes. As the videos are cell-phone optimized, IGTV even has its standalone app to give the viewer a video-channel browsing experience, combining features of both a video platform and a social media platform. Any video created can be further stored as part of a series, allowing brands to create content that keeps audiences coming back for more. As a business, you can effectively use this feature to develop edited content like:
- Product demos;
- Product promotions;
- Tutorials;
- Interviews;
- Behind the Scenes features;
- Curate experiences in trade fairs and expos;
- Highlight audience experiences.
You can also store your Instagram Live sessions permanently as part of IGTV videos.
- Instagram Ads and Promotions
Instagram allows you to create ads with customized audience reach and intended engagement requirements. What’s more, it also gives you the easier and faster option to convert your regular posts into promotional ones to elevate your reach. This makes the platform suited to all marketing budgets. Both options have their benefits, and the flexibility to choose not to have a full advertising campaign while aiming for increased visibility and audience engagement is undoubtedly a great feature for businesses on Instagram.
3. Instagram provides opportunities for Direct Sales Generation
In addition to creating convincing content that can lead to lead generation and sales conversion, you can actually sell your product and services using Instagram. Although these features are not globally available as yet, they are available in select countries and are of great advantage to any business. As a business, you can avail yourself of several new features that can bring sales directly without requiring your potential customer to step into a physical store. Some of the features that enable this include:
- Shoppable Posts
You can turn your grid into an Instagram shop by tagging your photos with shoppable pricing tags. When your viewers click on these, they can view product details and also directly purchase the product if you have the required seller’s catalog and payment options set up with the platform. These tags can be placed in any type of Instagram post, including Stories, reels, Live and IGTV content.
- Links in Bio
While Instagram profiles allow you to place only one clickable link in your bio, you can change it as frequently as you wish to generate maximum and relevant audience engagement. Whenever you use this link to direct your audience to your home page or any other landing page, ensure that the link is a functional one to allow for an organic flow of traffic to the intended web pages.
- Call to Action Buttons
Instagram business accounts can now also add call-to-action buttons on their profile. You can get your audience to book seats directly or reserve a service using your profile, although you need to set up an account with an affiliated site to allow for these transactions. If your business hosts events that require advanced booking of time slots or physical space, this is a very convenient feature to make use of.
4. Instagram shares Several Features with Facebook
Although Instagram has a large user demographic, it is still not the most used social media platform. That position is taken by Facebook, which boasts of over 2.5 billion monthly active users. However, with Instagram becoming a sister platform to the social media giant, Instagram now shares several integrated features with Facebook. All you have to do is link your Instagram and Facebook accounts together to avail of these shared features. When this is done, you can choose to auto-share any Instagram post you make onto Facebook simultaneously. In addition, you can also use several parts of direct messages interchangeably and run promotional posts on both sites simultaneously. As a seller, seamlessly integrating business pages and catalogs on both platforms is a big plus. Moreover, cross-posting makes it easier to direct user traffic onto the other platform, even if the target audience may not have an account on both platforms.
5. Instagram is all about Harnessing the Fun Quotient
Ultimately, building a brand presence on Instagram is based on the skillful tapping into the human quotient of Instagram users. The more relaxed and authentic your branding strategy is, the more likely you are to get followers and content engagement. For the best conversion rates, you do not need a big-budget investment in the platform. What you do need is to find a way to connect organically with your audience. Market yourself creatively and unassumingly by creating challenges, organizing giveaways, co-hosting live sessions with influencers relevant to your target audience, and simply posting unique visual content. If you have the right hashtag strategy in place and optimize your caption description, you will be able to reach your target audience and more within set time limits. Instagram makes it possible for you to monitor yourself in this regard by providing you the convenience of Instagram Insights. Using this, you can determine:
- Your optimal timing and frequency for posting.
- What posts bring you maximum engagement rates.
- How to plan out your future activities on the platform.
- Where to find collaborators and niche audience.
- Which features of the social media platform work best for your marketing needs.
6. Instagram Suits all Budgets
This is another crucial reason why businesses love Instagram. You do not need to burn a big hole in your pocket to establish your brand presence successfully on Instagram. All you need is the investment of time and some smart planning. You can bring about great conversion rates for your business simply by being a keen observer of the trends and your activity insights. Whether you choose to work with influencers or use your resources/ whether you choose to diversify your marketing tactics or stick to one/ whether you invest in engagement services to speed up your brand-building or choose to wait and let it build up organically, you are in charge! How you use to monetize your Instagram presence is entirely up to you as long as you do not violate the platform’s terms and conditions.
Conclusion
The ease of user interface and the benefits of cross-platform usage make Instagram a popular marketing platform for Businesses, both old and new. Tools that allow automatic scheduling, auto-replying, and cross-posting can easily be sued with the platform to ensure timely and uninterrupted scheduling and publishing content. In addition, with strict policies in place, Instagram has a good record of combing out fake accounts and bots. This assures businesses that most of the engagement generated on the site is organic. Even when a business may buy specific attention to push its visibility up on the platform, ultimately, it is the real-time engagement and conversion rate that determines the true success of online marketing. This makes Instagram one of the best choices for any brand to build a digital presence. So do not hesitate to take your Instagram presence a notch up. Invest wisely and see your brand reach the targets you want it to achieve!