Make Instagram Part Of Your Marketing Strategy: Instagram Ads & How To Use Them
Earlier this year, the millennial generation became the largest segment of the United States workforce. That fact also makes them the largest consumer demographic, and as numerous studies have shown, the most effective way to market to millennials is using social media. As such, your company, regardless of industry, should consider including Instagram-based ads as part of your overall marketing strategy.
Why you should advertise through Instagram
Currently, the photo sharing platform Instagram has more than 400 million users, which is around 80 million more than Twitter. Near the start of 2015, Instagram began offering businesses the opportunity to advertise through their service. Since the platform can put a business's offerings in front of a significant segment of such a lucrative part of the population, the company expected to take in $600 million in advertising revenue by the end of the year. It's also worth mentioning that Instagram hosts videos as well as images, and most major advertising agencies believe that online videos are now as effective as TV spots.
How to create an Instagram ad
To create an ad on Instagram, the first thing you need to do is link your Facebook account to your Instagram account. Next, you need to access your settings and click a tab marked "Instagram Ads." After that, you can access Facebook's Ads Manager and Power Editor, which are the tools you'll be using to create and upload your ads. Finally, you can create your campaign, which involves things like determining ad types, a release schedule, budget and selecting your target audience. As this Entrepreneur article explains, one of the best things about advertising through Instagram is that the platform allows you to specifically target consumers that would be most interested in your company's products or services.
How to make your Instagram ads eye-catching
Since Instagram's platform is available to business owners all over the world, you may be wondering how to make your ads stand out. The rules are not that different from any other kind of visual-based advertising. Given the platform's media and tech savvy audience, it's a good idea to stay away from stock images and use only original content. If you're not terribly artistically inclined, hiring a professional photographer might be worthwhile. You want to make sure your ads take full advantage of the high-definition screens your audience will be viewing them on. Whenever you can tie your content into a trending topic, do so, as it will increase your content's shareability.
This article was written by Mario McKellop of Examiner.com for CBS Small Business Pulse.