Jumping into the world of social media marketing can seem overwhelming at first. If done correctly, using social media to market your brand can be one of the most effective ways to get clients.
One of the biggest questions is where to even start. There are countless platforms out there such as Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, Pinterest, and the list goes on.
If you’ve landed on Instagram as your social media of choice, we’ll dive into everything you need to know about how to turn your followers into clients.
How to Get Clients to Engage With You on Instagram
Getting followers on Instagram is no easy feat. While this free social media platform seems easy enough, it will take some time and planning to get the most out of it.
After all, you want people to not only like your posts but you also want them to engage with your brand and to turn those likes into clients.
One of the first questions to ask yourself is why Instagram?
If one of your answers is that this is where your customers are, then you’re in the right place.
Keep Your Feed Quality Up
It takes more than just posting grainy cell phone pictures on Instagram to be successful. You really want to focus on quality over quantity here. All of the filters in the world may not be able to save a picture with a terrible resolution.
You want to keep your Instagram feed looking well polished, sleek and professional. The better your photo quality is the more engaged your followers will be.
A picture is worth a thousand words after all. Let’s hope that translates into a thousand clients
Make Sure Your Profile is Up to Date
One of the easiest places to lose followers and clients is by not having your profile up to date. If you offer a whole host of services that you don’t list on your profile, your potential clients may never know.
You don’t want clients coming and seeing really old and outdated information either. This might make them think that you’re no longer in business or that you’re not available to take on new clients, purchases, or work.
Keep your profile up to date and set a calendar reminder to refresh it every few months.
Create Creative Instagram Posts
When it comes to which pictures you should post on Instagram, you want to make sure you’re doing yourself justice. Your photos should be good quality and your posts should have some thought put into them.
Creative posts are ones that are well planned and thought about. Even the posts that seem funny and written on a whim, will have some forethought to them.
The more engaging, creative, and intriguing your posts are, the more likely people are to keep coming back to see what you’re posting.
Use Hashtags
The art of using hashtags could almost be a post by itself. Hashtags are a great tool if done correctly. If done poorly, they can really ruin the vibe of your post.
You never want to appear like you’re trying too hard with hashtags either. Overstuffing them into a post can make you look like spam.
Using too many hashtags can also make you seem unfocused. Try and stick to a couple of hashtags that are really relevant to your post and your brand.
The more genuine your hashtags are, the more likely people will be to post something about your brand while using them.
At the very least you should always use your brand’s hashtag in every post. This would be your company name or maybe a phrase that coincides with your brand.
Its All About the Captions
The captions on an Instagram post are where you can really showcase the personality and tone of your brand.
You want your caption to be succinct, well-written, and creative. A caption can help showcase a product or service and it can direct people to visit your website.
The right caption will lead your clients or consumers to your webpage where they can make purchases and interact with you further.
You can also direct clients to interact with you by leaving comments, answering a poll or sharing your posts.
Engage With Potential Clients
There’s more to Instagram than just posting pretty pictures. To get clients, you really need to engage with your followers.
Engaging with your clients can be anything from asking or answering questions to responding to customer reviews. The more people you engage with, the higher your chances are of turning one of them into a client.
Superficial engagement won’t do the trick either. You really need to genuinely form relationships with people in order for them to turn to you when they need your goods or services.
Post Something Every Day
When making your to-do list for the day, posting on Instagram should always be included. You need to post something every day to stay at the forefront of your client's minds.
Posting every day helps you stay relevant and engaged with your clients. Out of sight, out of mind, after all.
Have a Post Calendar
Think of what you’re posting on Instagram like an editorial calendar for a magazine. You should have a general idea of what you’re posting when.
For example, if you sell candles and you have a fall collection, you’ll likely want to start posting about the fall line in August. You then know every week you get closer to fall, you may start showcasing that line more often.
While you may not have every photo, caption, and hashtag pre-written, a calendar can definitely help you with planning.
Let’s say you want to do some Instagram couponing, geared towards the holidays. You can tailor your posts so that your couponing on Instagram coincides with your holiday calendar.
Using coupons exclusively for Instagram is a great way to track the success of a campaign as well. You’ll be able to see how many people used a promo code, a physical coupon, or a link while you were running the promotion.
How to Get in Contact With Instagram?
If you ever need to get in contact with Instagram, there are a couple of ways to do so. Start by visiting help.instagram.com. From there you’ll see answers to common questions, troubleshooting help, and their content information at the bottom of the page.
There is also a business support section you can look at, located on the left side of the page.
For more resources on using Instagram? even help getting ads up and running? Take at looking at how we can spring board your business success online.
