Instagram Marketing FAQ

There are two main reasons. Its visual nature makes it great for industries like beauty, fashion, food, and more. It is also one of the most popular social media apps with over 2 billion monthly active users.

With Instagram marketing, you can reach new audiences, promote products at low costs, and even sell directly in the app!

It is worth it! Brands have been able to influence purchasing decisions and grow their communities all through Instagram. Believe it or not, the stats show that 70% of shoppers look to Instagram for their next purchase.

Begin the process by creating an Instagram account if you don’t already have one. Then set up your profile as a creator or business. There are so many mediums within Instagram to market, from photo to video collaborations. Check out our Instagram best practices guide to see how you can use best use Instagram for marketing.

Instagram ads cost $0.40-$0.70 per click on average. Uploading content to the app is completely free and sometimes is enough the generate engagement. Paid ads can cost as little as $5 up to the thousands depending on your ad count and duration. Here’s an article all about Instagram advertising if you’d like to learn more.

You can use posts, Reels, Stories, and influencer marketing to market for free on the app! Sometimes it might involve sending someone a product.

Instagram Stories are designed to show the behind-the-scenes of your brand. Use Stories to share updates, live snippets, and engage your audience with polls and questions. You can also use Instagram Stories Highlights and ‘Instagram swipe ups‘ to promote your brand.

Instagram marketing can be self-taught over repeated use of the application or learned in an educational social media course. Sprout Social has an entire section of our blog carved out solely for Instagram marketing resources.

Yes! Instagram’s strategy has evolved exponentially in the past few years. You can find free and paid courses to help you master your Instagram marketing. One of the better courses out there is HubSpot’s Instagram Training Course.

The algorithm is always changing so sometimes books become outdated. However, recent books that have proven successful are “Instagram Secrets” by Jeremy McGilvrey and “Social Media Marketing Workbook 2022″ by Jason McDonald PhD.

Depending on what side of social media you want to be on, there are jobs for you. You can be a content creator as a brand or influencer and run your own business. Or you can work for a media agency in which you’ll oversee the Instagram strategy for various clients. You can also be the content creator or social media manager for a specific company.

We have an entire post about Instagram hashtags, but one thing to keep in mind is hashtags depend on your niche. Research what influencers and competitors in your niche are using and use those hashtags. It’s also helpful to have your trademark brand hashtag. Once you’ve shared enough hashtags you can use an Instagram hashtags analytics tool to find what worked best.

Marketing a business on Instagram requires a lot of trial and error and being consistently up to date with Instagram algorithm trends. The most important thing with any business on Instagram is consistency. People should be able to recognize your post without even seeing your brand handle. The first step to Instagram marketing for your business is setting up your Instagram Business profile and crafting a great Instagram bio for your business. Check out this article for the remaining steps to creating a great Instagram for business strategy.

Marketing a product is best done with an Instagram product launch strategy. This is where you plan out the marketing timeline in accordance with your product’s launch date. Make sure to promote your product well in advance using posts, Reels, Stories, Instagram Drops and influencer marketing to build the anticipation!

There are Instagram tools out there that help you manage and grow your Instagram presence. Sprouts Social is one of those tools that provides Instagram management tools. Our all-in-one social software can help you schedule posts, manage comments and hashtags, and run analytics. Tools will make your life much easier! We also have this post on the 18 Instagram tools that will help level up your presence and 9 Instagram analytics tools to help you analyze your success.

Other apps integrate well with Instagram to help you manage content and control workflow. This is useful if you have a large team working on your Instagram. There are many Instagram marketing apps out there to help you manage and grow your success on Instagram. To simplify things, we’ve broken down our list of the 25 best Instagram apps (free and premium) by category so review our tips to ensure that your visual content doesn’t go unnoticed.

Yes! There are services designed to help you with engagement, content creation, Instagram strategy, and growth. Those services may include working with an Instagram marketing agency to help scale growth. But you might want to check out Sprout Social’s Instagram integration first because our tool makes Instagram easier to manage on your own.

There are hundreds of Instagram marketing agencies with different specialties. Instagram marketing agencies help you manage and grow your Instagram page via campaigns, advertisements, and strategy development. But you may want to try a free demo of Sprout first.

Small business marketing on Instagram involves a mix of video, imagery, Stories, influencer collaborations, and even brand collaborations. Make sure to post valuable content and people will engage! It takes time and trial and error.

Instagram is a visual app which is why there are millions of #food posts every month! Many diners check out a restaurant’s Instagram these days before booking a reservation! Make sure to upload beautiful photos of your menu items to excite taste buds!

Make sure to geo-target by including your real estate location in your Instagram bio. For example, you can write “Luxury Real Estate in Saratoga Springs, New York.” Also make sure to add locations to your posts, tag relevant real estate pages, and add relevant hashtags like #homesinsaratogaspringsny.

Marketing a book is the same as marketing any product! Showcase clips, film videos of the author reading snippets, and share exciting excerpts and quotes.

Influencer marketing on Instagram is when a brand partners with an influential content creator on the Instagram platform to spread awareness with the influencer’s audience. The purpose of influencer marketing is to spread awareness, increase followers, and hopefully lead to sales.

Affiliate marketing is when an influencer or company on Instagram promotes a product. When that product is purchased via their unique sharing link, they earn a small percentage of the profits. It’s one of the main ways you can make money on Instagram.

Create an account with an affiliate program like Rakuten or ShareASale. Influencers and your brand can partner and you can track sales via their direct link.