Instagram might rank second as the most used social media network but it is the perfect platform for any small businesses’ marketing. Aside from being affordable and influential, Instagram’s graphical user interface creates an appealing presentation of a business’s goods or services. Not to mention, the advantage and additional exposure that comes when happy customers tag your business’ account on their purchase or experience.

A live video broadcast on Instagram is about to start –

According to statistics released by Oberlo, the photo and video sharing app have now reached an estimated number of 1.074 billion users worldwide. If your small business is actively using Instagram as a marketing tool and the percentage of engagement is positive, it is time to shift your focus from brand engagement to increasing your brand’s reach.

Why make the switch?

Established brands that have a decent number of followers and high rates of engagement must also realize that the number of active users is still rapidly expanding. This means that there are still a lot of netizens who are not aware of your business and what it has to offer; making it the perfect time to tap more people to look at your brand and show them your value.

Your Instagram’s reach relies on how your followers are responding to your content within an hour after posting. If the results are good, you can expect the algorithm to favor your content. This means, your business profile’s posts will be efficient in obtaining space on Instagram’s suggested post or explore page where its audience can eventually grow into customers.

Sounds good, right?

Switching your focus from engagement to reach requires a bit of work but it doesn’t have to be difficult. We’ve listed below 10 courses of actions that are organic, engaging, and safe to execute on your business’s Instagram page:

1. Make Use of Call to Action Wisely
2. Create Carousel Photos
3. Be Active on Instagram Stories
4. Use Instagram Live
5. Create and Post More Videos
6. Know When It’s the Right Time to Post
7. Launch Competitions or Contests
8. Slide Into their DM’s
9. Ask Your Followers
10. Don’t Reuse Content From Other Platforms

Make Use Of Call-To-Action Wisely

An article written by Dev Sharma, it states that call-to-action uses basic psychology. People are drawn to things that have a sense of urgency, are beneficial on to their endeavor, and have little to no risk at all. A call-to-action pushes your followers to either like, comment, or share your Instagram post. These call-to-action statements can be added into the caption of your post, like a simple text added to your stories, or by mentioning it while you go live.

Successful brands however do not stop with a single call-to-action. In addition to adding statements that will influence the audience to react to their post, savvy marketers add what’s called a P.S. Strategy which serves as the secondary call-to-action. It is often used as a follow-up where you either offer discount codes, freebies or invite them to check out your new product or service. By leading them to your Instagram bio or your Linktr.ee you can better create conversions and garner interest in your brand.

Use Carousel Photos

In 2017, Instagram rolled out their now highly used feature where users can upload a series of photos in just one post. While it may seem a bit obvious, it is another great option we often see business overlook. When used effectively your it encourages your followers to swipe left and view all the content you’ve shared. Aside from the fact that this strategy greatly impacts your reach, you can also later repurpose the uploaded carousel content’s individual images into a series of stories. And speaking of Instagram stories…

Be Active On Instagram Stories

The success of Snapchat’s transient posts pushed them to add the Stories feature where shared photos and videos are visible to a user’s followers – or in the case of business accounts, visible to anyone viewing their profile. There are many creative and strategic ways to utilize this feature. Some examples are as follows:

• Repost photos from your feed and add a call-to-action
• Post interactive content that will encourage your followers to respond via DM
• For business accounts with more than 10,000 followers, use the Swipe Up feature to highlight your product or service with a link on where they can place their order

By saving your best work, like carousels and short videos that were featured on your story and add them to your stories timeline you can quickly gain interest in your brand.

Do Instagram Live

Jump onto the bandwagon of Instagram Live and connect with your followers in real-time. By using the live broadcast tool, Instagram will help you bring the spotlight to your page by placing your live broadcast in front of regular stories.

And the perks don’t end there. Other strategies that can be applied to get ahead of the algorithm are:

• Use the right hashtags along with an appealing video description.
• Promote your next live broadcast on your business’ other social media channels, a few days before you go live.
• Showcase your product or service and its value
• Give rewards to your current viewers such as discounts or freebies

Create And Post More Videos

Aside from the fact that video content triggers a person’s interest, it’s also a powerful method to show off your business’s message or mission to the market. Although an image is easy to spot, videos are much better at implementing brand recall. Videos are the single most engaging type of content and it then creates a poignant connection to the viewers which will unconsciously direct them to eagerly comment, like, or even share your post on their pages — once again, helping your business profile acquire more reach.

Know When It’s The Right Time To Post

Even though Instagram’s algorithm is continuously changing, figuring out the ideal time of when to post on your business page is still vital. Through this technique, your page is not talking to the void but rather, gaining organic engagement and reach. To identify the right time of posting, head onto the business page’s Instagram Insights and see what time of the day your followers are most active. It can be viewed by hours of a day or by week. By using this you can ensure your fans are seeing your content and improving the chances that a potential new customer isn’t left out.

There are two strategies you should consider when deciding the right time to post. You can either select a specific time frame and stick to it (for daily posting) or you can also select different time frames for each day and experiment to see if your engagement times change. The latter is far from safe but it can easily help your brand’s reach since the main goal here is to tap into the market that would most likely be outside of the typical time frame of when your followers are active.

After deciding what your ideal posting time is, you can now proceed to scheduling your Instagram posts ahead of time, ensuring engagement and reach, as well as minimizing daily tasks on Instagram.

Launch Competitions or Contests

A brief note, this strategy is recommended only to those Instagram business accounts that already have a decent number of followers. This is to ensure that you will be able to achieve your campaign’s goal – trigger your brand’s reach.

A good example of this is through offering a giveaway as a reward. A good campaign creates content from organic users. Start with something that your users want, offer it as a reward and then explain how they will get it. Be specific, will you email them? Will the winner be announced on your page as post? Be clear – Instagram requires that giveaways closely follow their terms and conditions. After finalizing your campaign’s message, set specific ground rules that will encourage your followers to mention or tag their friends on your post or have them tag or mention your brand on their personal pages. It’s the perfect venue to get creative, fun, and show your brand’s personality while motivating new users to try their luck.

Utilize The Direct Message

While this is done on the back-end of your business profile, consider the fringe benefit it can add to your brand. By using DM’s you can forge stronger customer relationship plus a reward from Instagram. Users love a responsive business and it helps you appear relatable. In addition, the photo and video sharing app honor your frequent activities on their platform by increasing your business page’s reach. The following can be done to prompt your customers to communicate with you via direct message:

• Write on your bio how they can easily connect with you via DM
• Make sure to respond to your DMs promptly
• Keep your comments section on Instagram stories open
• Include a call-to-action to DM you on one of your captions

Ask Your Followers

This strategy supports several courses of action that were already listed above. You can make call-to-actions in the form of a question. It urges your followers to share their thoughts thus, giving you an inside look at what piques their interest. Incorporate their response into your goods and services, and you’ve gained another set of fresh content ideas you know your users will love.

On Instagram Stories and Live, you can include a Q&A segment or simply make use of Instagram’s interactive stickers to gather data from your followers. It’s also a great way to clear up any issues or customer concerns that can improve your brand’s image.

For competitions or contests, you can circle around a specific question on your campaign and have your followers answer them through the comments section. You can run a poll and ask about which is their favorite out of your collection of goods or ask about what they love most about your service. With this strategy, you’re not only improving your business’ reach, but you’re also gaining testimonials from loyal and previous customers.

Create Content That Is For Instagram Only

As a business, all social media channels share one main goal – connecting your brand to the online world. However, not all social media channels have the same focus. Specifically for Instagram, it was initially developed as a photo-sharing app so it focuses on visuals over text. This is important to take note of especially when you’re creating or repurposing content. The post that did very well on Twitter might not do well on Instagram – this can hurt your reach when left unnoticed. So, to avoid that issue, as an entrepreneur, you must be a great Instagram user as well.

And how can you achieve that? By simply spending some time on Instagram. Make posting quality content, checking your Instagram notifications, and exploring other profiles be part of your business’s social media behavior. Over time, the algorithm will pick up your business account’s social habits and place you in a space where there are new markets to tap on.

An Instagram user communicating via Direct Message

Final Thoughts

Do all these strategies overwhelm you? Or perhaps business is booming thus making it hard for you to stay on top of everything. Don’t fret! On Tap Social is here to help. You can say goodbye to your social media headache and let us take over so you can focus on your growing business! If you’re ready to free up some of your time, say hi to team@ontapsocial.co