2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses

Instagram is one of the largest social media platforms for businesses to market themselves on right now. Instagram has many tools to optimize awareness to your brand and or company. There are tons of people every day that go on Instagram that look for companies to follow or people to inspire them. We hope this 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses will help you in utilizing Instagram as a powerful tool to help grow your business!

If you do not have your business on Instagram, you are missing out on a ton of marketing potential in 2019. We want to work smart, so our businesses can succeed. Follow this guide for Instagram and watch how many followers and views you will be gaining!

First things first; before you even create a business account on Instagram for your business, make a game plan. Start off deciding what you are trying to sell or offer to the world and how you want to spread the great news of your company!

Obviously, you are using Instagram to showcase your business to as many people as possible. What you need to start thinking about is if you want to do daily posts, an Instagram story, a live story, interacting ads and Instagram’s multi-photo carousel tool.

Why Post on Instagram? – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses  

1. Different Platform To Share Content-While users could use their own website or LinkedIn to upload their content, Instagram provides a different style to how you share your own or companies information. This style operates through followers and likes. Instagram grants a new account the ability to look at other accounts that are similar to them and see how they gain popularity.

Another way to share content is to look at what your followers like on their accounts and see how your page can get them to spread your posts around. Instagram is a perfect building block to gain more views for your company by reaching out to your audience.

2. More Personal-Speaking in the third person provides a more professional outlook on the way your site speaks to its viewers, but with Instagram your account can also speak in the first person providing a more personal touch to what you or your company is trying to say. Instagram is a fantastic platform to say what you need to say, evaluate what works and does not work, then redo it all over again to find new ways to gain an even greater following.

Being able to use Instagram’s stories and live video, your followers will get to see a closer look at what you or your company is trying to do. When your followers see that you are doing something different to your routine, they might appreciate that you are trying to reach out to them.

3. Gain Popularity Through Likes-Whoever is running your or your companies Instagram account should know that engaging in the social media community is crucial if one wants to build a great following. Requesting to follow other pages demonstrates that your account is clearly active and is simply not just only publishing their own content and that is it.

If the account had a lower count of following numbers, it would show that you do not have the people who like your companies interest at heart. It is also important to get likes, if one were to get more likes, followers visiting your Instagram page will see that you are growing page and those followers would be interested to get on board with what you are trying to say. We hope this 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses at the very least shows you the importance of Instagram and the powerful impact it can have on your business if you start using it as a marketing tool!

What Are the Different Ways to Post on Instagram? – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses

1. Stories-Instagram stories are a key feature on Instagram that allow you to post photos or videos onto your account, but they will vanish after 24 hours, which is similar to Snapchat’s stories features. Using the stories feature can be a news outlet for your viewers interested in what you or your company is doing.

Some of these things could be when a new product is coming out, when something is going live, showing pictures of the company working hard in a meeting, etc. It can range to something simple or to something broad and great, so long as it makes sense and it is not harming an individual or a group of people.

2. Instagram Live-Instagram live acts as a feature that is similar to a conference call, only everyone who follows your Instagram account has the option to watch it or not. Something that is interesting about this feature is that your followers also have the option to comment on it, while whoever is speaking can see those comments as they are posted during the live video.

It is a great way to be personal to your viewers and have the opportunity to answer whatever is on their minds, so long as it is appropriate and perhaps it could benefit your company. Having the ability to be open to whatever people has to say to you, truly shows that you care about your followers.  Follow this 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses to ensure success when you’re using Instagram!

What are the Rules for Posting on Instagram? – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses

1. Timing is Key-Timing is extremely crucial when you want to upload your content on your Instagram account. The very first thing that you need to be aware of when using Instagram is know when your followers are active.

Be careful when posting on Fridays or Saturdays due to the fact that people might be out doing things with friends or family, so it would be best to post on other days. Of course, do not post at an absurd time, say 1 AM or 5 AM, some sensible time that your followers will be awake and have the time to look over your posts and like what they see.

2. Do not write TOO much-There is a word limit for Instagram and it is 2,200 words with 30 hashtags. Something to remember when posting content to any social media account, not just Instagram, is that people are extremely impatient. There might be a few readers that will take the time out of their day to read your lengthy post in its entirety, while the rest will either just skim through it or just skip it entirely due to the fact that people are always constantly on the move. A good way to get your viewers to read what you have to say is to summarize it or include a link in your post or bio. Doing that will get your followers to go onto your other pages, granting you more hits.
3. Post Frequently-No one likes a dead account, however no one likes an overactive account. It is important to remember that sometimes 2 posts a day is fine, but keep it at that. Keep your content original so that your followers will have something new to see on their feed and continue to enjoy liking your content.

Also remember in our 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses that when posting original content—keep the word lengths at a moderate level. If that does not happen, your followers will begin to lose interest. Always be engaging in your social media community, if someone likes your post and writes a comment, reply to them. Show that you genuinely care what you have to say to build a strong follower to company relationship.

Know Your Audience and How to Reach Them – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses

You want to make sure that you have a target audience. By targeting an audience, it will maximize your chance on getting clicks to your Instagram page or webpage. How do you filter your audience? You would use Instagram’s Insights Tool. This tool takes you step by step to create your own ad or post – we thought it would be extremely helpful to address audiences & how to reach them in our 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses.

It starts you off with a Campaign Objective. Once you have chosen your objective, you move on to the next step, which is the Ad Set. Within the Ad Set, you have options to edit the type of:

• Audience
• Placements
• Budget
• Schedule

You can customize the type of audience you want, by filtering by:

• How many people do you want to reach locally or nationally?
• What age group is your product or service best suited for?
• Is this more of a feminine, masculine or gender-neutral product or service?
• Did you only want it in only one language or multiple?

Instagram Insights will also provide you with an estimate of your Audience Size and Daily Results.

The next step to Insights is the Ad. This is where your creative side can come out to design the perfect Ad or Post. This section includes:

• How do you want your business to be represented?
• Will you be using the simple photo, the multi-photo carousel, interactive navigation, or a 30 second video?
• Where you can upload your pictures or videos.
• Where you can come up with a clever phrase, use hash tags, and attach your website URL

It’s All About The Details and Timing – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses

When posting on Instagram, you want to think of all the details that go into posting that will make people want to look more into your company. You want to talk with your followers, not at them. There are plenty of ads that talk at them and they end up getting unfollowed or blocked. Be part of the conversation for your followers to join in.

• Calls to Action – Use a call to action in your posts when applicable and appropriate. Ask your followers to share photos of them with your product or service. Ask them to come visit your website. Ask them about their opinions.
• Timing & Best Times to Post – You want to think about what time you want to post on Instagram. Believe it or not, the timing of the post is one of the biggest factors of whether a follower will see it. If you post during working hours, not many followers will be able to see it.

The best times to post will be in the morning before people go to work, and after work. More specifically, between 7 to 9 PM.  Everyone will be off work and looking at their phone for either a relaxing break or while they are trying to go home.

Your goal is to post during non-work hours. If you are a B2C company, you should also post on the weekends. The best days for engagement would be on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Always try to avoid posting during 3 to 4 PM. This is the worst time for engagement.

• Hashtags, Hashtags, Hashtags! – Another detail we want to add to this 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses is to make sure you use Hashtags! These are one of the most powerful tools created to help find content on Instagram. But when used incorrectly it can become a disaster. You do not want to overdo it with Hashtags. Remember, Less is More!  Also, try to use popular Hashtags that people are actively searching for on a regular basis. Don’t use irrelevant Hashtags; always keep them relevant to your post!  Click here to see a more detailed 2019 Instagram Hashtag Guide.
  
• General vs Branded Hashtags – There are 2 types of hashtags, General and Branded. The General Hashtags are the ones that are the broadest that anyone can find. Branded Hashtags are personalized hashtags for your company. These are the hashtags that could go viral.

Be Creative and Create Your Own Style! – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses

It is not enough to just post a picture; you have to make it aesthetically pleasing. You want your content to have different variations. If it is all of the same content, followers are going to become uninterested and decide to un-follow you. You can avoid this by having:

• Influencer content – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses
  
• Authentic videos of yourself with the product and or service – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses
  
• User Generated Content – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses
  
• A contest to win one of your products or services – 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses
  

For some, creating beautiful pictures or posts come naturally, for others it is a bit difficult. That is why you should utilize sources like Canva, Wordswag or Phonto and why we included these in our 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses.

People love originality. Making sure your company has a personality of its own is one of the best things you can do. That is why so many bloggers have become Instagram famous. They do this by telling their story. Tell your story to the world. Share what your company is all about, people will be happy to share your story.

Be you!  Be authentic; when you are your original self that is how you can create unique content that will leave your followers wanting more.  Do you have questions or want to learn more about our 2019 Guide to Instagram for Businesses?  Feel free to contact us Here or give us a call at 312-626-7445!