Use Instagram for Your Small Business and Get from Good to Great.

As an entrepreneur, you already know that the digital space is vital to your business. Whether it’s to create brand awareness, increase sales, or to boost customer loyalty. Instagram on its own gives brands the power to connect with their customers, their potential customers, make sales, etc.

You might look at huge companies like Nike or Coca-Cola and wonder how your small business can flourish on Instagram. Companies like Coca-Cola have huge followings making it easy to get engagement and results but that should not stop you. Even your small business with few followers can flourish on Instagram if you strategically make use of this mobile app.

Statistics on Hootsuite show that 1 billion people use Instagram every month, 500 Million users every day and 200 Million of those users visit at least one business profile daily.

Research shows that 80­% of Instagram users make purchases after discovering a product on Instagram. Importantly, 63% of these users are active users and visit Instagram daily. That simply means, there is a good number of potential customers for your business you can actually reach and grow your business. You just need to know how to reach them and engage with them.

In this day and era, small businesses who have discovered the power of Instagram have taken use of the gold mine opportunity the app offers. Instagram is an equal minefield for both big and small businesses and as a small business, know what’s there for you to get and get it. When you leverage Instagram correctly, you are putting your business up for growth.

How to make Instagram work for your small business.

Instagram I one of the apps that need you to put in quality time and attention if you want to see results. The more active you are on Instagram, and the more engagement you get from users, the more the Instagram algorithm will notice you and put you in front of more like-minded users.

1.Optimize Your Bio.

Your Bio should speak a lot in few words and reflect who you are as a business.

Make sure your bio has a clear and engaging description of your products or services. If your products are maternity clothing, let your description sell that out in an engaging way without using so many words.

Who is your ideal or target customer and how can you get their attention through your bio.

Make it short, straight to the point, and appealing to your potential customers.

If you have a website, which is your landing page, include its link back in the bio. You can also add a link back to your latest product, service, or your latest blog post.

Remember this, Instagram is not like LinkedIn and you can be casual on this app. Therefore, you can use fun eye-catching formats or symbols, emoji’s, unique typographies, etc.

Lastly, as you choose a username (Instagram handle) and a photo, choose one that shows who you are as a business. Use a handle that tells your potential customers you are the one by using your business name or something close to that. Consider using your business logo or your products or your storefront or just a photo that represents your business brand.

2.Create great quality content for Instagram posts.

Instagram is visual-based and this is one factor that makes Instagram one of the best digital marketing platforms.

That means, what people see on your timeline is very important when it comes to driving your engagement. Customers like, comment, and share what they see and what is appealing to them.

Put efforts into creating high-quality Instagram posts whether in image or video form. Ensure you take appealing image s for your products and consider using editing tools to make your photos more appealing.

Create more videos for timelines, Insta stories, and Ig Tv. Instagram videos don’t need too much time or too much production. Use a phone, shoot something short and creative and that can be done in a few minutes or even seconds.

Don’t focus much on selling your products, instead focus more on creating posts that are of high quality and whose content will engage your followers. When promoting your products, highly avoid using a blatantly promotional tone – don’t make it obvious you are advertising your products or services.

3.Share User-generated content.

User-generated content such as product or service reviews are great to promote your business.

Share content posted by your customers– images, videos, audio, texts.  When customers share positive experiences with your business, product, or service, comment on these posts and share them on your timeline, Insta stories, etc. Such content is great for increasing engagement, increasing brand visibility, and brand likability.

4.Make use of Hashtags.

Hashtags are big on Instagram and you should get familiar with them. Unlike other search tools like Google Search, the search tool on Instagram works with hashtags rather than keywords.

Using hashtags is a great way to increase your brand’s visibility and boost brand awareness. The right hashtags place your posts to users you want to engage with and help you appear in feeds of people following specific interests, topics, events, etc.

If your post appeals to someone who is interested, they will want to explore you further and most likely follow you.

Remember, your hashtags should be in line with your industry, your business, your products or services, or values that your brand supports.

Also, don’t use too many hashtags in a post to avoid looking desperate as this will harm your brand.

5.Always remember to engage with your audience – Comment and Direct Messages.

You cannot ignore the comments on Instagram because the comment section is a great space to engage with customers just like Direct Messages (DMs).

Don’t be among the businesses that publish posts and never look at them later. You need to put time and effort into monitoring your comments.    

Your comment section has so many questions from customers asking about product prices and other information about your products or services.

Keep track of your Direct Messages too and respond to your customers on time.

Above all, customers love it when you reply to their comments and DMs, and it’s one tactic to build customer trust and customer loyalty. Engaging with your customers increases your brand visibility and likability which is great for any business.  

6.Consider Paid Advertising to target audience.

Apart from the organic content (content you have not paid to boost), use paid advertising offered by Instagram to reach your targeted ideal customers.

If your budget allows, especially when you are launching new products, or times like black Friday, etc. promote your marketing campaign. And with the analytics on Instagram, you can monitor your growth, reach, and engagement on Instagram. You can also track your new followers and see users who have engaged with your paid advert.

Final Thoughts…

With the high numbers of Instagram users, you never know how many potential customers are out there for your business. It’s up to you to help them find you by actively and strategically putting yourself out there. Connect and engage with your customers every wake of the day.

Use Instagram to grow your small business’s brand awareness, to stay relevant, and to increase your business’s opportunity to grow its customer base.

Lastly, the results you get from your Instagram will be determined by the efforts you put into it.