How to take advantage of the advantages of Instagram in marketing

Sahl Tuesday,01 Aug 2023

Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms in the world, used by more than a billion people every month, and provides a great opportunity to promote products and services and build relationships with customers. But how can you exploit the full potential of Instagram in e-marketing? In this article, we will go through some of the basic steps that you must follow to launch a successful marketing campaign on Instagram, and we will share some useful resources that will help you to enhance your skills and knowledge in this field.

Set a clear and specific goal for your Instagram marketing campaign
Before you start posting any content on Instagram, you must set a clear and specific goal for your marketing campaign. What results do you want to achieve by using Instagram? Do you want to increase your brand awareness? Do you want to increase sales or revenue? Do you want to increase engagement or loyalty?

When setting your goal, you must make it measurable, verifiable, and updateable. You can use the SMART model to define your goal, which is short for:

Specific: Your goal must be specific and clear, leaving no room for ambiguity or interpretation.
Measurable: Your goal should be measurable, so that you can track your progress and assess your success.
Achievable: Your goal should be achievable and realistic, so that you can achieve it with the resources and time available.
Relevant: Your objective should be consistent with your brand's vision and mission, and add value to your strategic objectives.
Time-bound: Your goal should be time-bound, so you set a deadline for achieving it.
For example, if your goal is to increase sales on Instagram, you can define it as follows:

Specific: I want to increase sales on Instagram by 20% in the first quarter of the year.
Measurable: I will use the Shopz tool to add a purchase link to my posts, and I will track the traffic, orders, and revenue that comes from Instagram.
Achievable: I will provide my followers with exclusive Instagram special offers and discounts, share customer success stories and testimonials, and use targeted ads to increase recommendation.
Relevant: Increasing sales on Instagram will help me achieve my overall goal of increasing revenue by 50% during the year.
Time-bound: I will achieve my goal within the first quarter of the year, and I will review my results every month.
After defining your goal, you must select the target audience that you want to reach on Instagram. What characteristics, interests, and behaviors define your audience? What problems or needs do you help them solve? What channels or platforms do they use?

You can use tools like Instagram analytics or third-party software to obtain demographic, psychographic, and behavioral data about your Instagram followers and visitors. You can also use methods such as surveys, interviews, or observations to gain deeper and more detailed insights into your audience.

Next, you must create a buyer persona for your audience, which is a clear and detailed picture of the ideal customer you want to attract and persuade. You can use a template like this to create a buyer persona:

Name: Choose an appropriate name for a buyer persona, such as Ahmed or Sarah.
Image: Choose an image that represents a buyer persona, such as a real person or cartoon.
Background: Write down some basic information about your buyer persona, such as age, gender, education, occupation, and income.
Goal: Write down a buyer persona's goal related to your brand, product, or service, such as buying a new product or solving a specific problem.
Challenge: Write down the challenge a buyer faces in achieving their goal, such as lack of confidence in the brand, lack of awareness of the product, or uncertainty about quality.
Solution: Write the solution that your brand, product, or service offers to a buyer to help them achieve their goal and overcome their challenge, such as offering a guarantee, testimonials, or offers.
Message: Write a short, attractive message targeting a buyer, highlighting the benefits of your brand, product, or service, and urging them to take action, such as visiting your site, purchasing your product, or subscribing to your service.
For example, if your target audience is small and medium business people who want to improve the management of their business, you can create a buyer persona like this:

the name Ahmed
Background: He is 35 years old, married with two children, holds a BA in Business Administration, owns a men's clothing store in the city center, and earns a monthly income of between 10,000 and 15,000 pounds.
Goal: He wants to improve his business management and increase his efficiency and productivity, especially in the areas of accounting, inventory and marketing.
Challenge: He has difficulties tracking sales, purchases, profits and losses, controlling the quantity and quality of inventory, promoting his shop and attracting new customers.
Hala: We provide him with an easy-to-use, secure and effective business management application service that helps him organize and manage all aspects of his business through his smartphone, provides him with accurate and comprehensive reports and statistics, and helps him design and launch innovative marketing campaigns on social media platforms.
Message: Do you want to improve your business management and increase your profits? Find out how our business management app can make your life easier and save you time and money. Try it for free for a month and enjoy a special offer for new subscribers. Click here for more information.
Choose a catchy username, short description, and tagline for your Instagram account
After defining your goal and target audience, you should create an Instagram account that expresses your brand and attracts the attention of your followers. Therefore, you should choose an attractive username, brief description, and a distinctive tagline for your Instagram account.

Your username is the name that appears in your account link and at the top of your page, and is the name users search for when they want to find your account. Therefore, the username must be:

Is consistent with the name of your brand, product or service, or contains keywords related to your activity.
It is easy to memorize, pronounce and spell, and contains no numbers, symbols or unnecessary capital letters.
Unique and distinctive, and not similar to other user names or tags 

Competitive businesses.
For example, if your brand is “Zahra,” an online flower delivery company, you could choose a username like “@zahraflowers,” “@zahraonline,” or “@zahra_delivery.”

Description is the text that appears under your account name, and is the text that explains to visitors what your brand is and what you offer them. Therefore, the description should be:

Brief and clear, no more than 150 characters.
Attractive and creative, it uses words that draw attention and arouse curiosity.
Expressing the value of your brand, product or service, and the benefit you provide to customers.
A call to action, urging visitors to join your account, visit your site, or buy your product.
For example, if your username is “@zahraflowers,” you could write a description like:

“Zahra is an online flower delivery service that offers you fresh, premium flower bouquets at affordable prices. Order now and enjoy 10% off your first order.

The logo is the symbol or image that represents your brand, and it is the symbol that appears at the top left of your page, and in every post, comment or message you make on Instagram. Therefore, the logo should be:

Simple and elegant, with no extra details or multiple colours.
Consistent with your brand identity, and reflects its personality, values and vision.
Attractive, and makes your account stand out among other accounts.
Post diverse, interesting and value-added content for your audience
After creating an account on Instagram, you should start publishing content that expresses your brand, attracts the attention of your audience, and motivates them to interact with you. Therefore, you must publish diverse, interesting and value-added content for your audience.

Diversified content is content that uses different formats and types of media, such as photos, videos, stories, live broadcasts, and paid ads. Each of these forms has its own advantages and disadvantages, and suits a specific audience and goal. Therefore, you must diversify your content to increase your chances of reaching as many users as possible, to show different aspects of your brand, and to give your audience a rich and enjoyable experience.

Interesting content is content that grabs your audience's attention, sparks their curiosity, and makes them want to see, hear, or read. Therefore, you must choose topics, ideas, and methods that suit the personality of your audience, use attractive titles, images, and videos, and use appropriate hashtags to increase the chances of your content appearing in search results.

Value-added content is content that offers your audience a benefit, solution, education, or entertainment. Therefore, you must choose content that helps your audience solve their problems, achieve their goals, develop their skills, or improve their lives. You should also choose content that shows your customers' success stories, testimonials, or their opinion of your products or services. You should also choose content that highlights your brand's uniqueness, story, vision or values.

For example, if your Instagram account is “@zahraflowers”, you can post content like:

A picture of a beautiful and colorful bouquet of flowers, with the title “Looking for the perfect gift for your loved one? Order a bouquet of flowers from Zahra and make his day more beautiful,” and the hashtag “#flower #flowers #gifts #Valentine’s Day.”
A short video showing how flowers are packaged and delivered by Zahra, with the title “Behind the Scenes: How We Provide You the Best Online Flower Delivery Service”, and the hashtag “#flower #flowers #delivery #service”.
A story that tells the success story of a customer who bought flowers from Zahra, and how it affected his life, relationship, or work, with the title “Success Stories: How Zahra helped this customer make his wife happy on her birthday,” and the hashtag “#Zahra #Flowers #SuccessStories #Testimonials ".
A live broadcast showing a tour of the flower farm that Zahra deals with, and answering viewers' questions about types of flowers and methods of cultivation and preservation, with the title “Live Tour: Discover the Source of Our Fresh and Distinctive Flowers”, and the hashtag “#flower #flowers #livecast #tour”.
A paid ad that uses Reels to show different flower bouquets in a creative and fun way, with the title “Instagram Reels: Choose your favorite flower bouquet” and the hashtag “#flower #flowers #instagramreels #ad”.
Use the new and innovative features offered by Instagram
Instagram is an evolving and innovative platform, constantly introducing new features and updates that help you improve your content, increase your audience engagement, and attract new customers. Therefore, you must keep up with these features and updates, and use them effectively in your Instagram marketing campaign. Some of these features are:

Reels: It is a feature that allows you to create and share short videos (15 seconds) with different audio and visual effects, such as music, filters, and text. You can use Rails to showcase your products or services in an innovative and fun way, and to increase the chances of your content appearing on the Explore page, where other users can see Rails from accounts they don't follow.
Guides: A feature that allows you to create and share guides, tips, or recommendations on a specific topic, such as health, travel, or shopping. You can use Covers to show your expertise or opinion in an area related to your brand, to add value to your audience, and to engage them in dialogue or discussion.
Shops: It is a feature that allows you to create and share an online store on Instagram, where your audience can browse and buy your products or services without having to leave the app. You can use ShopZ to increase sales on Instagram, make it easier for your customers to buy, and improve their experience.