4 Instagram Rules Every Marketer Should Break Immediately

With over 200 million users and more than 55 million photos uploaded every day, Instagram is undoubtedly one of the most popular social media platforms. Instagram’s standing as a versatile tool for sharing compelling photos was reinforced by its acquisition by Facebook.

Visuals have always been one of the most effective ways to market products and services. But with the growing popularity of social media platforms such as Instagram, visual marketing has taken a whole new dimension.  These tools make it possible for brands to share images with millions of users and for these users to directly engage with their favourite brands.

Yet, from a marketers’ perspective, Instagram hasn’t received as much attention as other well known social sites have. Because the site mostly attracts personal users, many marketers easily overlook the advantages this app could add to their content marketing strategy.

Here are some common misconceptions about Instagram that could be hindering your marketing strategy:

Small Start-Ups Can’t Succeed On Instagram

Big brands have carved out their corner on Instagram. Through careful branding, encouraging user generated content and posting compelling images frequently, brands like Starbucks have been able to attract thousands of followers on Instagram. Admittedly, majority of corporate users on the platform are the biggies. But this doesn’t mean that small brands cannot successfully use visuals and videos to market on Instagram. From individual furniture artists to jewellers, and small tech companies, many smaller brands are indeed leveraging the fortunes of visual marketing on this platform.

Instagram Cannot Be Integrated With Other Platforms

One way to get the most from Instagram is to advertise and promote your Instagram presence on other social sharing sites.  A noticeable trend among brands is to create a custom Instagram tab on their Facebook page to encourage their fans to follow and engage with the brand on Instagram. Another alternative is to share your Instagram photos with your Pinterest followers using tools such as gramfeed.com or web.stagram. This integration significantly scales the visibility for your content by drawing in your followers from other social platforms.

Instagram Only Works for Visual Brands

Admittedly, a large percentage of business users on Instagram are in high visual industries such as fashion, retail, luxury, automobile, food and travel. However, businesses offering non-visual services such as those in insurance, banking, courier etc, can still leverage this social site. Other than cute cat pics, behind the scene pictures are also very popular on Instagram.  Bring a human face to your business by posting interesting pictures of employees, events, celebrations, or any visual content that gives your followers a sense of what your business is all about.

A carefully planned user generated content campaign is also an ingenious way to not only create images for your feed. Incorporating user-generated content into your Instagram strategy encourages engagement with your brand.

Using Hashtags Make You Look Like a Noob

Instagram hashtags can help you increase visibility for your content. Instagrammers largely use hashtags to find relevant feeds; so, not optimizing your photos with hashtags virtually makes you ‘unfindable’ on the social site. It is important to understand your community before choosing to use any hashtag- how do they search, what kind of phrases or words will resonate with them? Unlike in Twitter and Facebook where the use of more than one hashtags is looked down upon, using two or even three hashtags on Instagram can be an effective content optimization strategy.

Visual marketing with Instagram allows you to increase brand awareness, create content in a way that moves people, share this content and invite your followers to engage with you on a personal level. Compared to other social sites, Instagram lets you weave a story that connects your loyal customers to your brand, no matter how small or big that brand is.

If you enjoyed this article go ahead, follow me on Instagram.