With 400 million active users, Instagram is one of the most popular social networks. Unfortunately, some marketers have yet to see it as a way to increase conversions for their businesses.
However, Instagram is much more than quotes, selfies, and landscape photography. Instagram can not only bring a high amount of traffic to your website or blog, but it can also bring increased conversions if you optimize it for your marketing.
If you haven’t yet focused your attention on Instagram for marketing, or are simply having little luck converting your Instagram audience to paying customers, follow these easy five steps to create a successful Instagram marketing strategy that wins over your audience and gains new customers.
- Link to Your Blog or Website & Track Traffic
It’s such a simple step, but linking to your blog or website in your Instagram profile can significantly increase traffic to your website. If you have 1,000 followers, that’s potentially 1,000 people who will visit your website just by viewing your Instagram profile. Think of all the traffic you could miss out on just by skipping this easy step!
You can change your link as often as you want, too. This is helpful when you want to direct your audience to a current promotion or a specific product page.
But, make sure your link is trackable. Unfortunately, Google Analytics does not track traffic specifically from Instagram. To correctly analyze Instagram traffic, you’ll have to use a trackable link service, like Bitly, when you place your link in your Instagram profile.
Don’t be afraid to reach out to your competitors’ audiences. In fact, doing so can significantly increase your Instagram reach and, in turn, can lead to more website visits through the link in your profile.
Check out your competitors’ Instagram accounts. Then, engage with their followers through likes, comments, and mentions. Some of them will become intrigued with your engagement and could become potential customers when they view your profile and visit your link.
- Use Winning Hashtags
Some Instagrammers think that using the most popular hashtags on their photos is what will lead to new followers and conversions. However, the opposite is true. The most popular hashtags may get your posts seen more frequently by a huge Instagram audience, but it doesn’t mean you’ll gain more customers or sales.
The key to using hashtags correctly on Instagram is to use the right hashtags for your niche. There are plenty of helpful tools on the web to pinpoint the best hashtags for you.
HashtagifyMe is a good place to start. Here, you can search for the most popular hashtags based on one hashtag you type in. For example, if you sell lawncare products, you might type in “#lawncare” into the search feature. HashtagifyMe will bring up a web of other popular hashtags based on #lawncare, like #gardening, #pestcontrol, and #landscape. I use Hashtagify me, though I will also recommend ritetag (ritetag.com), which paid version I use at the moment and it is quite good.
Start using some of the suggestions in your Instagram