‘It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop’
Confucius
The world today has a strong fascination with social media platforms and that is where businesses have a great opportunity to engage users and potential buyers. Today, it has become indispensable for businesses to promote themselves across social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, and Twitter. These platforms with billions of monthly active users give businesses the widest outreach to grow familiarity as well as revenues.
In fact, if you are a small business owner, you should be quite aggressive about your social media marketing efforts. This is for the simple reason that social media offers an inexpensive way for small businesses to go big by enhancing their digital presence. Increasing digital presence not only increases the brand authority but can also earn through digital marketing.
If we look at it statistically, there are 3.96 billion active social media users across all platforms as per SproutSocial. This is exactly what has marketers shifting their marketing approach primarily to social media. Besides, if we compare the social media platforms, Instagram has clearly emerged as the winner among marketers given its enormous likeability among young generations. In fact, as per HubSpot, around 60 percent of marketers are now prioritizing Instagram marketing. Are you following the trend as well?
In case you are not, you are certainly missing the trick. For small businesses the benefits of social media are huge. To elucidate, this blog highlights some of the greatest hacks using which you can grow your business incredibly fast by leveraging Instagram marketing. So, let’s get started!
5 Instagram Hacks for the Growth of Small Businesses
Optimize the Feature of Cross-Post
Instagram recently came with the new feature of sharing the same post on other platforms like Facebook, Twitter, or Tumblr as well at the same time while sharing on Instagram. Utilizing this feature will get you more engagement and impressions from all the platforms and will increase the reach of your business. Along with this, it will also save you the time of sharing the same pictures on multiple platforms separately. Once the reach of your business grows, it can effectively lead to an increased possibility of leads conversion which can further help you in achieving your business goals and objectives.
How can you do it?
- You must first ensure that all your business accounts on other platforms are linked to your Instagram business page.
- Then, add the picture or video you want to post on the feed, and below the feature of adding the caption, you will see three options for adding the same post to Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter.
- Select the platform you want to add in and the same post will be shared on other platforms as well.
Employ Shoppable Feature to Sell
Instagram introduced Instagram Shop in 2020, to provide an opportunity to various small and big businesses to increase their revenues by adding their products on Instagram for the audience to purchase. With this feature, now people can shop from different businesses without even leaving the app. You can also now add the shoppable feature to the posts, in which the audience will be able to see the price, name, and link of the product by simply clicking on the post.
Other than that, businesses can also add the feature of ‘view shop’ in their profile which can give easy access to their target audience reaching your business. In fact, Instagram also launched the feature of live shopping on its Instagram post where business owners can give live demonstrations of their products to attract and acquire potential customers.
Effective utilization of Instagram shop features can assist small businesses in generating leads and eventually enhancing business growth.
How can you do it?
Note – To get the shopping feature, first, you need to get your product catalog approved by Instagram.
- After approval, go on your business profile, and click on the three horizontal lines in the top right corner.
- Tap on Business, then Shopping.
- After clicking on continue, you will have to search your product catalog and then choose the option of linking it to your professional account.
Utilize Reels to the Fullest
Did you know that according to Thunderclap, Reels can increase the engagement rate of your video content by 22%? Increased engagement can enhance business visibility and reach which can further enhance the possibility of people purchasing from your business and can assist in increasing the overall revenue of the company.
This opens up a great opportunity for small businesses to effectively reach new and wider audiences by creating creative and high-quality video content. Moreover, there are many features of Reels that can be used to increase the engagement rate and personal branding. For example, the features of closed captions can be really effective and useful sometimes because nobody can ignore the fact that 85% of videos played on social media are watched in silent mode.
During these situations, features like closed captions can really come in handy. This can assist in providing the captions to whatever information you are trying to deliver vocally to the viewer. Hence, even if a viewer is scrolling reels on silent mode, your message gets delivered.
How can you do it?
- Record your Reel and add whatever voiceover or talking audio you wish to add.
- After you are done, click on the Preview and select the option of stickers from the top.
- By clicking on Stickers, select the option of Captions
- After selecting you can voluntarily edit the transcribed audio and match it with your voiceover or audio. Once you are done, you can resize or change the color of the text according to your preferences.
Make Full Use of Hashtags
Everybody is aware that hashtags can increase the reach and visibility of your post but on the same hand, it is also essential to use relevant hashtags only that target your actual audience. Along with this, Instagram now has also allowed users to follow the hashtags of their preference which also assisted small businesses to be in constant touch with their target audience by using relevant hashtags.
Campaigns with hashtags like #vocalforlocal popularized the trend of promoting small businesses. Even many small businesses create their own unique hashtags (branded hashtags) that assist in creating a buzz or increase the retention power of the customers in remembering and recognizing the brand. Increased retention can lead to enhanced growth of the company.
Moving ahead, many people think that hashtags can be used only on posts or reels and not on stories because using hashtags on stories can spoil the aesthetics or can take too much space. However, you can always hide your hashtags in stories and still enjoy the benefit of extra reach and engagement. For that to happen, one can match the color of text containing hashtags with the background to effectively conceal the hashtags.
How can you do it?
- Researching the page of competitors can give you a clear idea of relevant hashtags that can be used to increase visibility.
- Going to the explore page and seeing the hashtags used by top trending posts on Instagram can also assist.
- Try using branded hashtags (customized hashtags of your business) to enhance brand recognition because there are multiple effective ways branded hashtags can improve your marketing campaign.
Avail Advantage of Interactive CTA
Call to Action or CTA refers to the phrases or words that direct viewers to take certain actions in any form. CTA assists in building up and engaging your audience and it can be added in multiple formats. For example, you can add phrases like Shop Now or Learn More in the caption of your, or you can add them in your stories. Another CTA which people often associate with is when business pages add different quizzes or ask for their votes on certain topics. This can increase the engagement of your page with the Instagram algorithm and can also engage your target audience with your business which can further assist in business growth.
How can you do it?
- Know the needs of your followers and try the hit and trial method to know what suits their audience the best.
- Businesses can post memes or posts and ask audiences to tag their friends or family members.
- Create a sense of urgency or fear of missing out by using phrases like “Hurry up only a few pieces left”
- Using phrases like ‘ Just one step away’ or ‘Few steps away’ can encourage the audience to take action because this will make CTA look easy to access and use.
To encapsulate, it is essential for small businesses to effectively understand the needs of their audience and then deliver high-quality content to engage and acquire customers. Hence, the above-given hacks will assist in increasing the brand visibility of your small business on Instagram without spending too much money.
