The benefits of Instagram

More visitors to your website

With more than 25 million businesses actively using Instagram to market to their target audience, it’s easy to see why so many people use the app to shop. In today’s instant-access retail world, shoppers want visual content to help them make buying decisions. Not only do they want visuals, but consumers want this content from people just like them.

Easy to Target (and Retarget) Your Audience

We know that targeting the right audience is key in the success of your ads. But how does Instagram help you reach your core audience? Well, if you’re familiar at all with Facebook advertising, you understand the power and depths available to reach your audience. Some of the targeting features include:

• Location: Whether you’re targeting to a whole country or just one city, location isn’t any issue.
• Demographics: Want to send your ads only to 37-year-old women who speak Catalan? Instagram can pinpoint language and gender demographics.
• Interests: Base your ads on what your audience follows on Instagram, including other businesses that may be your direct competition. You also can base interests on ads they click and apps they use.
• Behaviors: Define an ad’s audience by the actions they take on (and off) Instagram and Facebook. For example, easily retarget potential customers who have visited your website in the past but never made a purchase.
• Lookalike audiences: Your followers are part of a specific persona who is eager to see your content (and hopefully buy your products). So, you can target ads to people that are similar to the ones that already follow you or have purchased on your website.

1. Fast information exchange

• Instagram is ideal for informing customers of certain updates about your business in a quick and convenient way. Posting small announcements on a website quickly looks messy. Moreover, it lets the important information get pushed aside. Sending out a newsletter for every announcement or action can make customers feel intrusive and often has the opposite effect. Therefore, Instagram is a convenient way to keep customers informed without overwhelming the website or claiming too much attention.

2. Interaction

• If you want to know what’s going on with your customers and are looking for interaction, Instagram is an effective way. Your customers can comment quickly, without having to fill in a contact form. This gives you the opportunity to get to know your customers better in an accessible way. In addition, the customer will feel more personally heard. So this is a win-win situation for both parties.

3. Visual emphasis

• Instagram has chosen as its platform to emphasise visual content. A post therefore always contains a photo or video. Whether you want to leave a visual impression or not, the visual aspect provides many opportunities to present the brand identity in a strong(er) way. Challenging visual information is remembered faster than large pieces of informative text. Even if the written information is strong, people remember small powerful visual aspects online much better. Instagram can therefore be a good attention-getter, while your website can provide the information your customers are looking for.

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So the question is not whether you should use Instagram, but how to do it properly. In order to use Instagram in a good way, it is important that it fits the brand identity of the company. We at Intoteq are happy to help you come up with this branding strategy.