Good marketing means visuals. No one has ever argued about this. Since marketing began, in the 1800’s, advertisers understood the importance of visuals to enhance their advertising. Handmade flyers always had drawings on them, because visuals attracted attention. As newspapers and magazine came to the forefront, ads always had visuals. Fast forward to color and TV – advertisers took full advantage of visual media to promote their brands, and the visuals have always been more important than the words.
Today, advertising on TV is considered nothing more than an interruption, and commercials are either muted or fast-forwarded through. Online, however, businesses have the opportunity to use visuals in new and unique ways and to capture viewers with photos, infographics, videos, and more. ROI research, in fact, states that the results of a recent study show that readers and viewers are more apt to follow brands that use visuals and more likely to share those posts within their communities.
Instagram is Totally Visual and Thus Surging in Popularity
In marketing, visuals are far more appealing than text. This is why even text content depends upon visuals to engage readers, as businesses court customers and tell their brand stories. Audiences what to “see,” not just read. Many marketers don’t stop to think that images all by themselves can tell a story too, even a brand story. In fact they can, if they are carefully crafted to convey the “plot.” And trust and relationships can be built just as well using photos and videos as they can by text – sometimes even more. Here are three key strategies to use your Instagram account for storytelling and promotional benefit.
1. The Story and the Tone
Each time you post on Instagram, you will be telling a story through your images – a story that promotes your brand and you. You will need to clearly identify the story to be told and then carefully select those images, photos, videos, etc. that tell your story well.
- Maybe your story is about happy and satisfied customers using your product and you have photos that they have shared with you. Maybe you will use a carousel with 4 separate photos.
- Maybe you have a great, enthusiastic team, and you want to highlight them to your followers.
- Maybe you have a cause, and you want your followers to know that you are socially responsible. Your story might be a video of your team at an event of that charity.
ModCloth, a women’s clothing retailer targeting the female millennial generation, does a great job of this. Daily, they have new posts of their customers modeling their clothes; they run contests regularly, such as this one below. Customers were invited to submit a name for this dress. To enter, they had to re-post the photo, tag @ModCloth and use #ModCloth.
Immediately, followers are engaged and excited. The re-posts allow ModCloth to connect with the communities of its current followers, spreading its brand and its story exponentially.
You will also need to determine the tone of your story – is it humorous, serious, highly technical, poignant or quirky? This may determine whether you use a video, photo, an infographic, or carousel. You might want a video if you plan to show your team involved in something; you might want a carousel if you show customers sporting your T-shirts; or you could just use a single photo as Toms Shoes often does to show its charitable work. This online shoe retailer donates a pair of shoes to a child in need for every pair of shoes bought. And they often show photos of happy kids and volunteers, to remind followers how important their purchases are:
What a great feel-good story, and what a great relationship Toms is building with its customers, current and future. These posts are widely shared, as followers, particularly millennials, want to engage their communities. Stories can appeal to specific audiences, and Toms uses its knowledge of its audience to select its posts.
Millennials, who accounted for over $5 billion in Internet sales in 2014, have two very prominent traits. First, they rely on their communities for advice and recommendations on companies with which to do business; second, they want to do business with companies that have social responsibility. As long as Toms continues to tell its charitable outreach story, its brand spread is guaranteed among this highly important customer base. It is now a company worth $625 million, and growing daily.
A Note about Video: If you intend to use video as a part of your Instagram marketing strategy, you do not have to hire a professional videographer to create it. In fact, video with a “homemade” feel is more popular. But use a good tool/app to edit them. There are a number of great ones that allow you to edit wither in real time as you are filming of after you have finished. Videohance is one of these tools, along with many others.
2. Promote Your Brand Using Any or All of the Following Tactics
- Partner with influencers in your niche. You do this the same way you partner with influencers on your blog. Find those influencers, follow them, like them, and request to re-post their stuff on your account. Ultimately, you will be able to request a reciprocal arrangement, and they will re-post your content too. This helps you develop a much larger audience. And when an influencer re-posts your posts? Your brand gains credibility. These relationships and alliances that you begin on Instagram can then carry over to the same alliances on other social media channels.
- If there are related businesses that serve your demographic, pay for sponsored posts with those accounts. Their audience becomes your audience too. This is not a hugely expensive strategy, considering the benefit that you may get from inserting yourself into new online social communities.
- Put CTA in captions and visuals, instructing users to click the link in your bio to get something of value – then, gate that value to get an email address. This builds your target market and allows you to continue to grow your email marketing list, which you will use to promote your brand, your story, and your value to customers and potential customers. Often, email is the first step in moving readers/followers into your sales funnel.
- Put a link in your bio that takes followers to other valuable content that relates to your current post. This content is most often housed on your website and your blog. And be certain that the content to which you are pointing your followers is highly valuable to them. There is nothing worse than a viewer being re-directed to content that is boring, irrelevant, or useless. You will have lost those followers forever.
And how do you promote your Instagram business? Tweet me to share your thoughts!
from Darlene Milligan http://ift.tt/1RKC3Ep via transformational marketing
from Tumblr http://ift.tt/1V8vFfr
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