We spoke with Convince & Convert’s Lauren Teague, a digital marketing and social media strategist, in this interview to get her opinion on the most effective Instagram marketing tactics for 2023.
The discussion begins with Lauren’s key insights from the 2023 Instagram Stories Benchmark Report, along with Rival IQ founder Seth Bridges. Lauren is clear that the best value will come from making a great first impression, which entails creating compelling content for your news feed and supporting that content across the platform. Recent data indicates that Instagram posts have a higher reach rate than Stories. Although she wouldn’t be surprised if Reels soon took over the Feed given Instagram’s recent change in emphasis towards video.
Features of Instagram to boost your marketing efforts
The 13 distinct ways brands can engage with their followers on Instagram—Feed, Stories, Highlights, Reels, Video, Guides, Shoppable posts, Stickers, Custom AR filters, link in bio, captions, hashtags, DMs, and CTAs—were laid out by Lauren and Seth during the webinar. Whew!
Key insights from winning Instagram strategy for 2023
Several subjects were discussed by Lauren and Seth, including audience research, competitive benchmarking on Instagram, social media consumption trends, Instagram creative content, and making the most of Stories’ transient nature. Here is a summary of the main lessons learned from this webinar.
Know and expand your Instagram audience
Creating an audience persona is the first step in a successful Instagram marketing plan. Lauren provided her go-to audience mapping tool to assist marketers in determining whether their target audience actually hangs out on Instagram, identifying the problems that the audience is facing, and figuring out how to address those problems. With this framework in hand, marketers can begin creating content that serves the audience rather than trying to sell to them.
Lauren reminds us that if your follower count rises but your reach and engagement fall, it doesn’t matter in our desire to grow our fan base. She advises combining earned media, community building, and audience engagement with all of the sharing on Instagram, Stories, and Reels.
Investing in a solid hashtag strategy is another crucial approach to grow your Instagram following. In order to prevent your brand’s content from becoming buried in the noise, Lauren and Seth explore how it is preferable to concentrate on choosing ones that are moderately used and have a high average engagement rate.
Produce excellent Instagram content
Lauren lays down her process into three steps that start with producing valuable material in order to create content that sticks out among the Instagram throng is an excellent place to start when developing this kind of material.
Add some amusement to the content is the second step in Lauren’s three-phase method. Although “entertainment does not necessarily mean it has to be funny,” it does imply that the audience should be able to identify with it and be motivated to read your content.
The last step, according to Lauren, is for firms to engage with customers directly by commenting on their posts and replying to their direct messages.
Take note of the Instagram marketing tactics used by your rivals.
Seth and Lauren also discussed some more ways that businesses can use material from other social media platforms to produce content for Instagram. Seth cited Kum & Go as a great example of a convenience store business that uses humorous customer DMs to create new Instagram content. The objective is to use that time investment to improve your Instagram marketing approach in addition to having an influence in the DMs. For more information on this tactic, listen to Seth’s most recent interview on the CStoreTALKS podcast. You can also find more inspiration from the top convenience store companies on social media by visiting the 2022 CStoreDecisions Social Media Awards.
Take use of Instagram’s new features.
There have been a number of new Instagram features introduced over the past several months that may have an effect on how your company conducts business there. For many firms with fewer than 10,000 followers, the link sticker was a welcome addition.
Syracuse University student describes how he experimented with making a few Instagram stickers and noticed that it resulted in millions of views. Syracuse’s Instagram marketing plan now includes creating custom branded stickers and animations as the platform’s popularity continues to climb.
When Instagram added the Shop button to the main navigation menu of the app, e-commerce enterprises received a boost. You can shop from the main Feed, a Story, or even from the Stickers using the button. Lauren appreciates that Instagram Shop doesn’t need you to exit the application. For marketers, this is PRIME.
This is your moment, savvy marketers who have researched the ideal times to post on social media in 2022 and have done their customer mapping homework: share content and direct users to your Shop for a flawless shopping experience.