How to Promote a Business-Related Instagram Account in 2024

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It is quite well-known that promoting a business profile on Instagram in 2024 is somewhat difficult. The main reason is the growing competition. You will have to try harder to achieve growth in reach and conversion. However, there are methods – both free and paid – to promote your account effectively.

0. Preparing an Instagram profile for promotion

Before you start promoting your Instagram page, you need to prepare it properly:

0.1 Set up an Instagram Business Account

If you want to attract more potential customers, you need to switch your regular account to a business profile. You will have access to features that are not available with regular user accounts:

1. Setting up feedback buttons – mail, phone number, and driving directions.
2. Indication of the brand’s field of activity.
3. Statistics of views, bookmarks, and subscriber actions.
4. Running and tracking the effectiveness of advertising.

Switching to a business profile is available in the Settings, in the Account section.

0.2 Pick a good name and a decent avatar

Your profile name may, of course, be different from the login. You can change it when editing your account. The name is displayed next to the profile photo.

A few recommendations:

• For a personal professional account, it is better to specify a first and last name or a nickname.
• For a brand or corporate account, use the official name without abbreviations.
• You can indicate your professional field in the name and link it to the region, for example, “Cat grooming Atlanta”.

This way, potential customers will be able to find your account in a keyword search.

It is equally important to add a high-quality image to your profile. For a personal account, a portrait on a neutral background is totally fine, for a brand, a logo or some other official symbol will do. Be sure to keep in mind:

• Instagram crops the image to make it round.
• The profile photo should be associated with the company or its services, or with the brand philosophy.

1. Free account promotion

There are several ways to promote on Instagram that require only your time and effort:

1.1 Shoot Reels

Instagram Reels is a feature that allows you to create and share short vertical videos. See, Reels videos that are shorter than 90 seconds can be included in recommendations, where they will be seen by more users.

More than 1/2 of Instagram users interact with Reels – liking, commenting, or reposting – at least once a week. Reels videos account for more than half of the content shared in private messages. Thus, such an opportunity for promotion simply cannot be ignored.

Take a closer look at the number of Reels views across different accounts – you’ll easily spot that even when the number of somebody’s followers does not exceed, say, 5,000, the Reels views can be as high as 10,000 or even 25,000. Of course, some of these Reels could have been the product of an advertising campaign, but many collect views organically.

1.2 Add hashtags to every post

Hashtags on Instagram help to:

• find posts in search;
• publish posts in the feeds of users subscribed to these hashtags;
• create thematic collections.

There are several types of useful hashtags: on the one hand – unique or branded, on the other – high-, medium-, and low-frequency:

1. High-frequency hashtags define general topics (#pets, #clothes);
2. Medium-frequency hashtags emphasize a specific topic (#summerinLA, #buyalaptop);
3. Low-frequency ones allow you to focus on a specific moment (#gotmysoda, #raininwinter);
4. Branded contain the name of a brand or company (#nike, #acer);
5. Unique ones are launched and used by a specific account owner (#NikeOnAir).

Stick to the first three types of hashtags for promotion – they will make it easier for various folks to find your posts. Try not to add more than 10 hashtags to a post. The maximum number allowed is 30, but it’s better not to overuse them so as not to clutter up the body of your post. Hashtags can be put right into the text if they are relevant, at the end of the post, or in the comments to it.

Hashtag selection tips:

• use hashtags that are relevant to the topic of the publication or to whatever is depicted in the photo;
• focus on medium- and low-frequency tags;
• do not copy the same set of tags from post to post, but choose them individually;
• avoid hashtags created to boost your performance (for example, #like4like) – Instagram can shadowban you for that;
• use RiteTag or Hashtagify services to select hashtags.

1.3 Work with geotags

This kind of promotion will increase the reach of each post. Texts with geotags are included in the collections marked with the same location. When your post is actively liked, commented on, or saved, its chances of being included among the recommended ones in such selections increase. If your business has a physical address, add it to your profile and note it in every post.

1.4 Create masks

One rather unconventional way to promote Instagram is through creating masks. It’s a fun twist that makes your brand stand out from the crowd and increases its recognition. One condition: masks should be unique and such that people would really want to use them. The complexity depends on the purpose and possibilities – from a cool filter to nuanced volumetric effects. To create a mask yourself, you can use the Spark AR Studio service. There are a lot of how-tos regarding it, so even a beginner can figure out the settings.

1.5 Use cross-promotion in Stories

Find bloggers operating in your niche who have a similar subscriber count. Suggest mentioning them and their products on your account, whereas they will mention you on theirs.

Stories is the most suitable tool for such advertising. Individual posts in the feed will be too promotional, but the format of short videos or photos with comments can be interesting. A personal meeting and interview will add a touch of sincerity. In some cases, mutual PR can even be successfully applied in posts.

This should not be a one-time event – it is best repeated weekly, as long as you find one or two interesting bloggers. You don’t need to be shy when writing to them – many people are interested in cooperation.

1.6 Organize joint live broadcasts

The live broadcast format lets you get closer to your audience, and joint broadcasts are also an opportunity to exchange subscribers. The idea is similar to cross-promotion: find suitable bloggers and come up with a topic to discuss. Or, alternatively, organize some kind of a debate.

Just keep in mind:

• the content of your accounts should be somewhat related;
• it is better to prepare a script or at least a plan to avoid pauses in the broadcast;
• you should warn about the live broadcast in advance to gather interested viewers (you can even start a countdown timer).

1.7 Comment on popular profiles’ posts

All you need to do here is to follow the top accounts and leave comments under posts with a large number of views. Ideally, those comments should reflect what your account is about at least a little bit. Comments that get a lot of likes or replies are displayed at the top.

2. Paid promotion

Commercial approach can really help you promote an Instagram profile because it increases the activity on the page and attracts the target audience. There are three most sensible ways to go about it.

2.1 Targeted advertising

This – a bit “official” – way of advertising on Instagram truly helps to attract a relevant audience. Targeted ads promote posts and stories (planned or existing ones) very well. The advantage is that you can customize your impressions: choose the audience’s geolocation, age, gender, and interests. Set up ads on Instagram, and if you need more options, do it through the Facebook Ads Manager.

2.2 Promote your account through bloggers

If there are big bloggers in your niche, be sure to book their services. Choose an influencer carefully – he or she should have positive statistics without any manipulations. Check each blogger manually by requesting their account data for 24 hours, 7 days, and the past 2-3 posts.

A useful tip: when ordering advertising from a top blogger, close your account for this period, manually processing all subscription requests. Yes, it will take some time, of course, but the conversion rate will be higher. It’s all about us, humans, and our natural curiosity: people will subscribe to see your posts. During this period, you can also update your profile information by adding a couple of sentences for the fresh subs.

2.3 Organize sweepstakes

If you already have some active subs, you can try to organize a contest. Remember:

• a gift should be a service or product from your brand;
• tell more about your company/product in the contest description;
• publish only high-quality content during the contest period, avoiding insignificant posts;
• offer simple conditions for participation: in particular, do not require reposting – this can discourage some people.

Conclusion

Remember that Instagram promotion is a set of actions that need to be performed almost non-stop to stay afloat and keep your audience engaged. I recommend combining free and paid methods: each of them works in its own way, providing you with the much needed growth.

And don’t forget that the main way to promote Instagram is to create interesting content. This is the key rule of promotion, whether free or paid. You cannot promote something that is not of interest to the audience. Even if you decide to spend lavishly on advertising, boring posts won’t attract followers. Thus, consider very carefully what and how you will publish.