Instagram is one of those platforms that keeps increasing in popularity and will continue with the rise of visual marketing. What Instagram started it was a place to take selfies and food porn pics, has now turned into a viable option for businesses and marketing. Instagram over the last few years has seen a boom in the number of brands and business jump onto the platform. Some of the benefits of Instagram, is it can increase customer loyalty and create buzz around your brand, if done correctly.
CREATE BUZZ WITH INSTAGRAM CONTESTS
A fun way to engage your followers and create that buzz is through a contest. This can easily be implemented by having your users take a photo and tag it with the hashtag of your choosing. This will allow you to easily search through pictures that have used the hashtag and allow you to share some from the community. It is important to note to not choose a generic hashtag for your contest. I recommend testing a few out and doing a search on Instagram, if you don’t find any results, then it could be a winner.
BUILD LOYALTY THROUGH ENGAGEMENT
Too often I see a brand that posts a picture and gets a lot of comments, but never ever responds to anyone who will ask a direct question. If you have rules for Twitter when responding to a question or concern, I would recommend possibly implementing that same strategy with Instagram. I have been impressed by the person or brand that took time out to directly comment and tag me in the comment, just to make sure I saw it and read it.
PEEK BEHIND THE CURTAIN
Remember Dorothy, in the Wizard of OZ as she peeked behind the curtain? In this case you are the wizard and welcoming that peek. This can be incredible for a brand to show the behind the scenes of a photo shoot, maybe employees in the office or even setup for an event that is coming up. What better way to generate a lot of excite around an event and asking your fans to use the “official” hashtag for the event. Social Media Examiner is having their annual “Social Media Marketing World” and uses pictures like the one below to show key locations for the event locations.
Recently, Instagram published the Instagram Handbook for Brands, but don’t worry you won’t be getting your hands on it. However, they do have an excellent Instagram for business blog and Tumblr blog which highlights pieces from the handbook. I would definitely recommend checking it out and getting inspiration and ideas from it.
What else would you add to this list of ways to use Instagram?
Colin Haas 
Using hashtags that are relevant to your target audience help immensely to get people to your page 🙂
Hayley, absolutely! Using key terms surrounding your target market is key. Helping you become seen by those key hashtags that others are using to search for info around that specific topic.
Reblogged this on Digital 3000.