Hands up if your brand is on Instagram? Now, keep your hands up if you have a clear understanding of the platform and the best strategies to employ.
If the imaginary hand you had in your head hesitated at either of those questions, please read on; this post is for you!
Instagram isn’t appropriate for every brand, but it’s certainly worth understanding what you could be missing out on:
• 150 million monthly users who aren’t connecting with you
• A target audience of men and women aged 18 – 29 years
• 8500 likes a second that are going to your competitors rather than you
• 16 billion photos shared – some of which could be linked directly to your brand
• A global network of super-users called ‘Instagramers‘
Instagram is one of the most important social media sites for harnessing ‘people power’. These users have the power to propel your content around the globe and into the lives of potential customers whether they’re at work, at school, on the train, in bed or walking down the street.
What’s more, unlike platforms such as Twitter or Facebook, users have to make a proactive effort to be part of a brand’s campaign on Instagram. Rather than simply retweeting or filling in a form, they’re often asked to take, post and hashtag photos – something which is not normally necessary on other social media platforms.
What is Instagram?
Initially released on 6th October 2010 and founded by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, Instagram was created to provide three key solutions:
1. The promotion of better mobile phone pictures by using a range of filters, thus reducing the number of mediocre/low quality images.
2. To make sharing easier by enabling rapid dissemination of your finely crafted photos to Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, Tumblr, Flickr and VK.
3. Provide faster upload speeds giving a slicker and quicker service than most other platforms out there.
Nowadays, users are posting pictures of just about anything and anyone who’s anyone has an account. Even animals. (Sorry; we couldn’t resist).
Grumpy cat has over 120,000 followers on Instagram.
Users also add hashtags to their posts, and just like the hashtags used on Twitter, these help categorise images and enhance search capability. So, what are the top ten tags on Instagram? While it may seem like a good idea to hashtag your images with any or all of these, if they don’t match the content, you’ll do more harm than good. A targeted approach when using hashtags is important on all social platforms, but it’s imperative on Instagram.
1. #love
2. #instagood
3. #me
4. #cute
5. #like
6. #follow
7. #photooftheday
8. #tbt
9. #followme
10. #girl
What brands are using Instagram well?
Brands are using Instagram in increasingly imaginative and original ways. As one might expect, as the adoption of Instagram has become more widespread, the competition for fans has increased accordingly: On the downside, this means the usual tactics, such as beautifully shot photographs or outrageous captions are no longer effective; however, on a more positive note, it pushes brands’ creativity to the limit.
Brands that have a large following include National Geographic (3,279,867 followers), Victoria ‘s Secret (2,999,915), Nike (2,776,233), Forever 21 (2,154,642), MTV (1,809,971) and Starbucks (1,735,422). If you visit these accounts, you’ll see that they’re all doing similar things – they’re regramming their fans’ posts, adding behind-the-scenes content, posting intimate exclusive video footage and interacting with their fans.
As well as this, some brands are expanding their Instagram following via hashtag campaigns:
#marcfam
Fashion brand Marc Jacobs’ holiday campaign sees thousands of its Instagram followers tagging their Foursquare, Twitter and Instagram photos with #marcfam. After being curated, they are fed into a dedicated page on the Marc Jacobs website, giving fans a brief taste of fame as their photo is displayed for all to see. The Marc Jacobs Instagram account currently has almost 1 million followers.
#fpcloset
Following this trend, clothing brand Free People use their fans’ Instagram photos not only as a means for competition entry but also to showcase their clothes. Each week, they choose a Free People competition winner from a selection of fans who upload a tagged image of themselves wearing current Free People clothes. They have almost 900,000 followers.
Ford Fiesta #fiestagram
Ford Fiesta was another brand which tapped into their audience’s desire for a moment of recognition successfully. Their Europe-wide campaign to promote its car’s new stylish features involved a competition hosted on Facebook, but fuelled by Instagram. Users were encouraged to submit photos tagged with #fiestagram and the best of these were displayed across giant live digital billboards and online galleries across Europe. Prizes were given out frequently with the top prize being a Ford Fiesta.
@crack_the_us_open
Some brands, such as Heineken and their ‘Crack the US Open’ initiative, used Instagram in innovative ways. Moving away from the usual trend of asking users to submit photos via Instagram, they led users on a scavenger hunt, from a dedicated Instagram account, offering fans the chance to win one of nine pairs of tickets to the US Open Final. The user had to locate a person from a mosaic of images, then follow the clues in order to progress through the hunt and show their detective skills by entering a codeword on what they thought the winning image was. This campaign was a great success because not only was it managed in real-time, but it was an original idea that captured the fun-loving spirit of Heineken and its followers.
Special K #nyaspecialk
How do you get users to want to try your latest product? That in itself, can be an uphill struggle for some marketers. Special K, for the launch of their new flavour, not only managed to excite its followers but also gained large amounts of exposure for their brand via Instagram.
A Swedish initiative, customers were asked to post a photo featuring the Special K brand in some way, along with the hashtag #nyaspecialk (meaning new Special K). The next time they went shopping, if they showed their phone with the photo and hashtag to the cashier, they received a free box.
This was a clever initiative as it rewarded its existing customers whilst gaining new ones and was very straightforward for the fans to participate.
#sibyarmani
When Instagram video was launched, many brands pounced by creating videos and airing them on their own channels, but one brand, Armani, realized the power wasn’t in them sharing their own videos, but influencers sharing videos they had made themselves.
For the launch of its new perfume, Sì, Armani partnered with high-profile fashion bloggers on Instagram. One such person was Chiara Ferragni. Her 1.2 million fashionista following and her ‘self-made’ videos promoting Sì instantly launched the perfume into the arms of Armani’s targeted audience, generating over 40,000 likes and over 460 comments. On Chiara’s videos alone.
This was heralded as one of the first uses of Instagram for business.
What are Instagram’s sponsored posts and how can they support my brand?
are invaluable for brands looking to increase viewership amongst an audience that don’t already follow them. Whilst there was a fair amount of uproar over the introduction of ads, Instagram have deliberately drip-fed them into the system and only allowed a handful of brands to come onboard, such as Adidas, Ben & Jerry’s, Burberry, Lexus, Levi’s, Michael Kors, General Electric, PayPal and Starwood.
Sponsored posts will only be used in connection with users’ current interests (taken from Facebook) and if the user feels they’re not relevant, they have the option to hide those that don’t interest them. The Sponsored icon at the top right of the photo indicates sponsored posts, but to ensure they don’t interrupt the user’s experience, Instagram have taken a native advertising approach.
Currently, there are few brands trialling advertising on Instagram and users are relatively open to the idea, especially as Instagram promises not to use users’ photos for these, a point much contested in Facebook’s Sponsored Ads.
Should I use Instagram video?
It’s less of a case of Vine vs Instagram as it makes sense to use the functionality that already exists. is now part of Instagram’s functionality whereas Vine is a separate app that allows you to easily share your content to Twitter and Facebook.
With 15 seconds of video available, including a range of filters, it’s enough time for you to get your message out whilst keeping your audience’s interest. After all, from a user’s point of view, there are no ads to sit through (as there are on YouTube) and they know in advance exactly how long they’re going to be watching it for.
There are several ways in which brands can use Instagram videos:
Promotional campaigns: 15 seconds with which to tease your audience about your new product, launch it with exclusive footage, or give an exclusive behind-the-scenes look
Video Series: What better way to continually engage your users than with a cohesive, streamlined video campaign? Keep fans interested with regular video updates based around a theme that show off your brand personality. These could become a feature or it could be a short campaign that culminates in a final video.
Commercial style videos: Even though you’ve only got 15 seconds, this is enough to simulate TV commercials and can portray humour, excitement and even suspense effectively.
Tutorials: If a user can learn something valuable in 15 seconds then your videos are sure to be a success. Videos say more than words ever could, can be understood internationally regardless of language and can help brands become known for being experts in their field.
What are the top three tips for a successful Instagram account?
For brands just starting out in Instagram or those looking to grow their account, follow these three tips to ensure a solid foundation:
1. Don’t hark on about your brand. There’s only so many product shots a fan can take before they hit the ‘unfollow’ button. Instagram is about lifestyle and glimpses into other people’s worlds – what are you giving them that meets this criteria?
2. Don’t use the same content on your Twitter, Facebook and Google+ accounts that you do on Instagram. They’re different platforms, with different audiences and therefore different expectations. Have a strategy for the content on each one.
3. How are your images standing out on Instagram? Your users aren’t so much concerned with beautiful, carefully shot images that you would need for print campaigns, but they do want photos with unusual angles, focus, lighting, and most importantly help to tell a story or set a scene.
4. Understand how to use hashtags and how they will contribute to the number of people liking your photos. For example, a fashion brand could do a beautiful photo shoot in Paris, and tag it with the brand name along with #Paris. Be aware that many people liking that photo may only like it because they like Paris, and not because they have any particular affinity with your brand.
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