As Instagram introduces yet another useful feature, the Archive, we reflect on the utter brilliance this particular app has brought to the business world. But with good stuff, there’s a small reminder of the times it can be used terribly. So, let’s take some time to appreciate the development of this incredible, versatile and applicable application and what it can do to your business.

The Ups to Instagram

Out of Sight, Never Out of Mind: The Archive

The Internet is loving it, we’re loving it. Who wouldn’t love it?

Just swipe one away if you wish, no need to delete, because that would be horrific. With the Instagram Archive feature, you can hide images you’re maybe not sure on, and if you wish to switch, just bring it straight back in.

 

This is a real positive strategy for testing your image succession. Use this to compare posts, and judge your followers’ preferences right next to each other. You can also monitor your overall front page, making sure every image intertwines with the previous, and if it doesn’t, well, just archive it for now!

Maybe it’s time for a spring clean – this way you can highlight your best ones, but it may also be nice to look back on pictures from the past.

To archive a post you’ve already shared, tap “…” at the top of the post and choose “Archive.” You’ll still be able to see it when you tap the Archive icon in the top right corner of your profile. – Life Hacker

Archiving is the present and forever, and one of the best apps of our century has just stepped up with it, phew! Maybe this calls for a blast from the past or progression feature!

 

 

 

 

Instagram Means Business!

Auto, tech, fashion and mobile groceries. There are tons of startups – freelancers, the lot. Instagram sails with you through your ventures and offers small tips on when to promote, also offering analytic reports of the month. Have a look and get inspired by the success stories.

 

Success Story 1 – Skol

 

 

 

The Goal: 

To create the Synonym for Sun, planning to increase awareness of its brand as the beer of summertime and Carnival period, the biggest celebration in Brazil.

The Solution: 

Skol created campaigns focusing exclusively on the Instagram stories feature. By creating short snaps, they offered a more immersive experience by expanding to the entire screen, focusing the audience’s full attention on the brand.

The Result: 

Extremely positive. Their ad recall increased by 29 points, remaining across their preferred age group. They hit their goal with a 3-point rise regarding the number of people, primarily being women, who saw Skol as the beer most closely tied to summer.

 

 

 

Success Story 2 – Blibli.com

 

 

 

The Goal: 

To boost the brand and business. Blibli.com simply cared to raise awareness of the brand and third party weekly product promotions, all the while encouraging traffic to their website.

The Solution: 

They used Instagram’s ads located in stories, looking to generate top-of-mind awareness. Structured promotional themes were shared throughout the weekdays creating a high-impact approach featured products.

The Result: 

Very successful. They saw a 22-point lift in ad recall and a 7-point lift in message association amongst their target audience. Also seeing success with almost 5,000 incremental conversions as a result of its ads in stories.

 

 

 

Success Story 3 – Stance Socks

 

The Goal:

A forceful launch. Stance Socks, on a quest to generate exposure for their new product line of Star Wars socks. They mainly focused on the return on investment into their brand exposure, whilst increasing sales specifically over the holiday periods.

The Solution:

The team campaigned with a series of link and carousel ads, built around inventive photos. Stance sensibly referenced film captions and hashtags to invite engagement and discussion. Using the Shop Now button on the ads, the customer was lead to a specific landing eCommerce page on the company’s website.

The Result:

An impressive return. The campaign took force with both movie fans and footwear fanatics, boosting the return by a powerful 36%.

 

 

The Creative Features

Instagram is down with the trends; in fact, they set the trends. Apart from kind of adapting the facial features from Snapchat, of course, but that was inevitable (and hey, we have it all on one platform now). They offer the whole package – location, stickers, hashtags, time and place, and used correctly, you are only inviting more customers to your main page.

Our favorites:

• The discover people option. Find people you had never heard about based on your liking preferences.
• The facial filters. You can be a scientist or a koala, depending which day of the week!
• The Rewind. Play around and rewind your time.

Being able to customize your pictures with fun, branded scribbles or the latest Pride celebratory rainbow pattern is by far the best way to get creative now with your snaps. Creativity is engaging. Engaging stories lead to your story ends up at the beginning of your viewers” story-watching priority whenever you post. So, the more capturing the better.

Let’s not forget about the starting flair — the filters. Probably the most difficult option to choose from, as they’re all so appealing! Consistency reflects the page’s style, and remember first impressions are everything! Ah, Instagram.

Understand Why Instagram Is The Bee’s Knees

Now, there are some things we all should know about the fantastic possibilities and historical events that have been covered on Instagram before we move on. Take some time to appreciate these things here.

As for you digital marketers and social media specialists out there, detail is critical. With some minor research, you can find tons of tips to really make an impact. For example, hash tagging, mentioning, the stories, online and offline merging and reviewing your competitor’s profiles every so often. Read more here on how to setup your account, showing your best pictures and focusing on your customers.

The Downs of Instagram

Non Affordable Mistakes

With that in mind and enough attention to detail, you could save your mistakes for never. There is a lot of value to be added to your profile to grab your followers attention. There are also a lot of competitors who hold the key to this information, so you really can’t afford to not be in the know.

Instagram is photography, so having an amateur photographer selling your products may not be the best option. If you are selling your unique product through photography, you should nail the lighting, this goes with saying, use your flash wisely and correct the angles.

If you compare images across successful and unsuccessful accounts – you will see some prime examples of why these pictures just aren’t cutting it. You can see some terrible examples here. And some rather fabulous ones here.

There’s a trick to Instagram, you need to love it, you need to love your followers and love your competitors, love your product and take a good picture of it! Your content needs to be engaging, relatable to your audience and regular. With these three delivered, you’ll be a pro in no time.

 

The “Instagram Face”

The unfortunate shift of society into ‘The Face of Instagram’ has seen a disturbing change of usage across marketers. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) should be within social media business strategy. Due to some sectors pushing products that shouldn’t necessarily be targeted at some audiences, for restriction purposes. This should not be abused but adapted to make efforts to your customer’s values. There are plenty of guides to help you take the right path.

Let’s look at Out of Africa, the company who not only do more than just sell high-quality shea butter skin care products; they also help improve the quality of life for West African women and children. Proceeds are donated to education medical care and cooperatives that create Women’s jobs in West Africa.

Advertisements Galore

When entering ‘Instagram’ into Google, we are presented with the 4 top searches, and surprise! In order it’s:

• Kim Kardashian
• Justin Bieber
• Rihanna
• Miley Cyrus

However, not pinpointing but maybe pointing the pinky finger, it seems particular celebrities haven’t been complying with the FTC guidelines (Federal Trade Commission) in the world of freebies.

Take care of your sponsorships! Instagram offers analytics to monitor advertisement, showing the weeks progression, a beautiful history presentation, your most popular posts, past promotions success, best promotions to use, when and where, visitor traffic and so much more! So you have no excuse not to optimize on this channel. Here are some tips from the experts themselves.

So, it goes to show Instagram is more than meets the eye. You can essentially grow a business empire for whatever your needs be, show the whole world the new car you just bought, or better yet, store your whole pictures bank. It really does have a use for anything. Go, follow your dreams!

Click here to create your new Instagram business account, and let us know if you need any help along the way.