The growth of social media, and particularly Instagram is having a profound effect on how small businesses market themselves. Many are discovering the power of Instagram to sell their products and services and build brands awareness. But in order to properly leverage the potential of Instagram and what it could do for your business and growth, it’s important to stay abreast of what’s best practice in the Insta-world.
Here’s my five biggest small business Instagram trends for 2019.
Direct messages (DMs)
Gone are the days when you can slap “No Dms” in your Instagram bio and get away with it. People – your customers or potential customers – want to be heard! To grow your community (and to become BFFs with the algorithm) you need to be interacting over DM. Stop ignoring and start communicating.
Live video
Instagram loves live video. Your customers love live video. Instagram live video is literally your magic potion to speed up the know > like > trust > buy factor. Want customers from Instagram? Start live video-ing!
Stories
Stories is a collection of 15-second videos and images that only stay viewable for 24 hours. Continue to use stories to encourage reaction and engagement. But be creative, include stickers, questions, and polls!
Analytics
The vanity metric of worrying about how many Instagram followers you have is so three years ago. In order to deliver valuable content that will help to grow your account in 2019, you need to first check the posts that gave you the most user engagement last year. How do you get this info? Step 1: Tap Insights, Step 2: Tap Content. Step 3: Tap See All. Step 4: Tap on the sentence that says “Showing all posted in the past 1 year sorted by Engagement”. Step 5: Filter the middle option to ENGAGEMENT. Step 6: Tap apply.
Then, share more of that content which gave you the best numbers!
Sharing videos
Sharing videos is another way to increase brand exposure and make your customers feel appreciated. If they tag you in a story, be sure to share it, to encourage more customers to tag you in their stories! When they tag you in a story it increases your exposure to their followers, which means more potential customers!
Brooke Vulinovich, Social Media Expert, www.villamanagement.com.au
