Instagram Ads? What is it and is it worth trying?
First, you have to take a look at the numbers. Instagram has 400 million monthly active subscribers. More than 75 million use Instagram on a daily basis. It is one of the most popular social media platforms. It has been around for five years, and its popularity has not waned so far.
What’s not to like about Instagram? It’s a photo sharing and video sharing network. You can follow all the celebrities on Instagram. You can like pictures and videos of your friends. You can regram or repost same videos and images of your family members.
You have the option to make your account public or private. If you want to be popular and get noticed on IG, you can add popular hashtags to your images to make it easier for other people to search you. You don’t have to write kilometric descriptions of your posts. You can even send direct messages (DM) to other people.
One of the most popular uses of Instagram is its capabilities to act as a virtual album that’s why many online shops use IG to market their goods and services. Looking for hard to find Air Jordan shoes or the cheapest Glutathione supplier, you can bet people will be using IG more than any other apps or browsers.
Since the proliferation of online shops, Instagram as a marketing tool has become really effective. It has become apparent that in order for Instagram to grow and continue to becoming innovative, it has to adapt to marketing strategies employed by other social media platform.
Hence the birth of Instagram Ads. Recent years has shown that more and more people are using the internet to purchase goods and services. It doesn’t matter if they were booking a plane ticket going somewhere or buying the latest gadgets online.
What matters is that ads on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are widely received. It has changed people’s perception of doing everything online.
How Instagram Ads Started
The first Instagram ad was released on Nov. 1, 2013 in the US only. In the next few months, it became available to other parts of the world. Instagrams ads look like the usual images uploaded to IG with one exception- the word “Sponsored” appears on the top right corner of the image where the time is usually visible.
Instagram offers different options for business owners to try out depending on what specific results they want. Is it to create brand awareness? Or is it to compel the reader to respond to the call to action of the buyer?
Instagram gives business owners and marketers the perfect platform to use to tell a visual story about the business. It is interesting to note that the quality of your content will be a determining factor on how the public will receive your Instagram ads.
So what are the valuable tips that you need to follow:
- Start with a clear objective. You must know why you are doing the ads in the first place. Your concept must be aligned with what you are trying to achieve. Is your goal intent to create brand awareness or recognition? Then content for your ads must be all about creating awareness for your business.
- Create your own kind of branding. Successful businesses have their own kind of branding. It could be with specific color schemes used or a distinct logo found everywhere. It’s anything that will make the audience recognize it immediately as your brand. It’s like Mark Zuckerberg or Steve Jobs and their uniform combination of shirts/sweats and jeans. They will always go hand in hand.
- Focus on creating wonderful ads. Your ads must be artistically shot. Your ads must be able to answer customer’s needs. They must make people pause for awhile and grab whatever you are offering because you are letting them see the need to have that product.
It is also important to note that your Instagram Profile also matters.
So you also have to ensure the following:
- Account name must be easily identifiable to the business.
- Use high definition photo of your logo as the profile photo for your business.
- Text should be kept at a minimum. However, choose the 3 best hashtags that would describe best your business and include it in your captions. Hashtags will help readers find you.
- Be active by thanking people who like your posts or replying to comments. This is the perfect opportunity for you to interact with your business’s followers
- Use image tools to enhance the quality of your images
How Instagram Ads Work
Ads on Instagram can be created three ways- through the ads API, ad creation and Power editor.
However, you cannot create Instagram ads without connecting your Facebook Page to Facebook Business Manager
- Setup your Facebook Business Manager
- Add your Instagram account to Business Manager
- Setup Instagram Ads in Power Editor
- Download Facebook ads account
- Click Create Campaign
- Click on Create a New Ad
- Set your spending limit
- Configure and schedule your ads
- Configure target audience
- Select ads placement
- Select All Mobile Devices
- Select bidding or optimization goals
- Choose Accelerated or Standard delivery options
- Configure the ads
Measure results of Instagram ads
A good marketer knows the value of measuring results of a particular campaign. This is very important because it allows you to check whether ads are working or not. Statistics for your ads are visible on both Ads Manager and Power Editor.
You can also schedule the reports of your Instagram ads. You can customize and filter the different columns in Ads Manager.
Wrapping it Up:
Instagram is one of the fastest growing social media networks in the market today. Creating Instagram ads is necessary if you want this platform to help your business.
However, not everyone can see the ads you have placed. This is because Instagram filters ads based on hashtags and information of the reader based on his or her activities in both Facebook and Instagram.
What are your thoughts on Instagram Ads? Share your story in the comments below!
