What is Instagram Marketing And How to Use it?
INSTAGRAM MARKETING: WHY AND HOW TO USE THE PLATFORM FOR YOUR BUSINESS
Instagram is not just a way to post beautiful images. Used strategically, it can become a very effective marketing tool. This visual platform par excellence allows you to identify your potential clients and build a more attractive relationship through images, videos, and stories.
Interest in Instagram is increasingly shifting towards marketing, as the latest updates released by the platform show. In September 2017, Instagram announced that it had reached 800 million subscribers, a milestone considering that just three years ago it had 200 million users. More than 52 million images and videos are posted every day, while 300 million users use stories daily.
In France, 11.8 million users go online every month (2018 statistics). According to estimates, 41% of users are between 16 and 24 years old, 35% are between 25 and 34 years old, 17% are between 35 and 44 years old, and 8% are 45 years old or older.
In short, Instagram can be a very powerful tool for building your brand. More than 60% of platform users say they have already discovered a new product or service on this social network.
These statistics are very impressive, however, I am often asked the question of the relevance of Instagram to your business. So I decided to write this article to answer the question: does your business really need an Instagram account to grow?
Why use Instagram Marketing?
Instagram has had a very fast growth. Born in 2010, it reached 100 million active users in February 2013 and 200 million in March 2014. It is growing exponentially until reaching more than 800 million active users per month in September 2017. Among these users, 500 million They use their account daily. This figure grew stratospherically during 2017: in fact, it went from 150 million daily users in January 2017 to 200 million in April and 500 million in September.
31% of Americans earning over $75,000 are on Instagram
According to demographic data collected by Pew Research in 2016, nearly a third of wealthy Americans use Instagram.
In particular, it is estimated that:
38% of those earning less than $30,000 use Instagram
32% of those earning between $30,000 and $74,999 use Instagram
31% of those who earn more than $75,000 use Instagram
This figure is very interesting for companies that sell medium-profile products. In fact, the largest and most active age group on Instagram is 18-29 year olds. Many of these people are students or new workers. Sure, they may not have a high income yet, but they are the group most likely to spend on items promoted by Instagram influencers.
Instagram marketing, used by 70.7% of companies
This is another stat that indicates how fast Instagram is growing. In 2013, 11.5% of US businesses used Instagram for marketing purposes. This percentage increased to 18.4% in 2014, 32.3% in 2015 and 48.8% in 2016. In 2017, this statistic reached 70.7%, surpassing Twitter, which was present in 2017 by 67, two%.
Advertising on Instagram and why it works
Unlike the simple operation, the world of Instagram advertising is not intuitive at first. Especially for those who have never had to deal with Facebook ads or online advertising in general.
Advertising on social networks follows different logics than traditional advertising. First, after you create and publish a sponsored post, it must be approved by the platform. You can decide to opt out at any time if it does not comply with the rules on online advertising.
Then, the appearance of the ads is based on an auction system, so the price, benefits or the type of action that you want to obtain from the recipient of the ad can vary over time. As a general rule of thumb, for the sponsored post to work well, it should be as close as possible to those posted on social media in an organic context and far from a typical poster or print ad page.
On Instagram, it is possible to sponsor content using various tools and many types of ads. As for the tools, the photographic social network offers the possibility of creating ads both through its official application and through advanced tools such as Facebook Ads. Instagram also offers different types of ads, some more interesting than others, for those who need to promote their business.
Conclusion
However, some operations will continue to be more interested in using the platform than others. I’m mainly thinking of companies that can share artistic content or e-commerce platforms (sharing photos of computer code is not very sexy).
Take the time to implement a consistent long-term ad, organic, and Instagram marketing strategy, and you’ll be impressed with the results it can bring you.
And don’t worry, it’s not particularly complicated. Everyone can do it. Developing an Instagram strategy and reaching new audiences mostly takes thought and time.
