Since its conception in 2010, Instagram has grown from a little-known photo sharing app to a social media powerhouse. Within the first two years, the fledgling platform shocked the social space by acquiring 40 million users. Unwilling to be outdone, in 2012 Facebook made a wise business move, acquiring Instagram for a billion dollars. By 2018, Facebook had grown Instagram to an astonishing consumer base, exceeding one billion monthly users and placing it firmly in the top 4 social media platforms. Astoundingly, today, Instagram is growing even faster than Facebook itself, particularly among younger people.
With 300 million users joining the platform every month, Instagram marketing makes so much sense. Besides the obvious sheer size of its consumer base, the basic functionality of the social media application lends itself to marketing and product endorsement. Savvy marketing companies are picking up on the ever-increasing opportunities that Instagram has to offer, and 2019 has presented quite a few.
2020 Instagram Trends
1. Instagram Stories: Since their creation in 2016, Instagram Stories have taken the social platform by storm. These powerful compilations of photos, text, and augmented reality allow users to communicate a wide breadth of information to their Instagram following in a single communication. When considered in the marketing space, Instagram Stories present an incredible opportunity for businesses to drop digital bombs of exciting promotional material for their community to view. The blessing and the curse of this Instagram marketing strategy is that stories only last for 24 hours. While this actually lends itself to a nice, clean Instagram page, it also means that the stories must be managed and updated regularly. However, marketing departments don’t seem to mind the workload so much once they discover just how impactful the stories are for their marketing funnel.
2. Integrated Approach: Although Instagram Stories are definitely powerful, research shows that an effective marketing strategy for Instagram trends toward the integration of Stories plus more traditional social pieces like still pictures and video. IGTV has made it possible to easily highlight brands through shareable video. Perhaps the most unique Instagram innovation, Cinemagraphs now offer a fascinating amalgamation of still photography and video to pique the interest of viewers. There is unfortunately no magic formula for the combination of these; however, the general idea is that if you’re regularly using all of the tools available, you’ll keep your content fresh, relevant, and varied. In turn, this should lead to increased interest and greater audience engagement.
3. Authentic Influencers: While utilizing influencers to promote brands can be extremely effective, these days, Instagram users can smell a phony from a mile away. If influencers are part of your Instagram marketing strategy, make sure that each of them is personally invested in the product and that their audience has confidence in their opinion. This goes a long way in establishing authentic promotion, and by extension, quality leads. Along this same line, many businesses are currently seeing success with influencer campaigns that involve a network of invested influencers who promote designated hashtags to unify their campaign across Instagram. This effective pairing of hashtags and influencer marketing ensures consistent branding through a marketing campaign while providing the authenticity that appeals to Instagram users.
4. Direct Purchasing: With the onset of buying direct on Instagram, businesses now have an open door not just to promote their products on the platform, but also to sell them. For Instagram marketing companies, this is fantastic news! Young people spend a lot of time on Instagram, and the convenience of purchasing directly through a platform that they are comfortable using means that you are much more likely to close the sale right there on Instagram. Primarily for this reason, Instagram Stories ads which contain purchase links consistently perform better than more traditional forms of advertising which route buyers away from the advertising platform to another website. According to Instagram’s own research, “of the 500 million accounts using Instagram Stories, one third of the most viewed stories come from businesses, and one in five stories gets a direct message from its viewers.” Clearly, Stories users enjoy interacting with and purchasing from their favorite brands on Instagram.
5. Channel to Channel Sharing: It’s no secret that Instagram has a variety of different feeds, and even a variety of apps to manage them. From Stories to IGTV to the Explore grid, Instagram trends show that the platform is increasingly streamlining the process of linking between its unique formats. This crossover means that it is now easier to boost views in different streams without having to reinvent the wheel. Brands can simply share the same content across a variety of Instagram channels. And since Facebook owns Instagram (as well as a number of other powerhouse social media applications!), it’s not surprising that Instagram content is also shareable across platforms.
2019 has already proven that Instagram marketing is increasingly popular and wildly effective, particularly among younger generations. Not surprisingly, 64% of 18-29 years use Instagram. Among those active users, 8 out of 10 follow at least one business, making Instagram perhaps the most compelling avenue for brands to reach Millennials and Generation Z.
The social space has always been known for creativity and innovation, and Instagram is no exception. Even this year, the platform has introduced a wide variety of new features. These innovations are not only thrilling to users, but also to businesses, who are increasingly discovering the seemingly limitless possibilities of engaging with their followings on Instagram.
However, navigating the social space and keeping up with engagement is often a daunting task for businesses who are unfamiliar with the application and/or its target audience. Teaming with an Instagram marketing company like Max Effect Marketing allows your business to fully utilize the benefits of social media without having to hire a full-time Instagram expert. This can lead to more unified branding, increased community engagement, and multiplied sales. 2020 Instagram marketing trends are in your favor. It’s time to leverage this powerful tool to grow your business.
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