The world has become increasingly busy leading to an explosion in demand for content that can be consumed quickly and efficiently. Lengthy blog posts, eBooks, and whitepapers have become less effective with focus shifting towards visual content such as images and videos. These content formats have become the status-quo in how people consume information and how they decide what brand or agency is worth their time. Couple this with the growing popularity of photo-sharing platforms such as Instagram and the result is a lead generation process that has undergone a fundamental shift.
Since humans are visual learners, showing your brand value is far more powerful in converting visitors into leads. It just takes one great image or video to capture a person’s attention and convince them to follow your brand and willingly give their information through future messaging. Successful lead generation on Instagram relies on driving traffic to your page to build a following that will eventually click-through to a targeted landing page. To ensure success in lead generation through Instagram, use personalized hashtags, images which highlight your product, targeted call-to-actions, and engage with your target audience.
Use relevant hashtags
Just as specific keywords can boost the rank of your content on search engine results, personalized hashtags can push your products up on Instagram search. However, don’t use a hashtag that is directly related to your company but rather to your industry while keeping it unique enough to differentiate your brand from others. To further increase chances of discovery and engagement, make use multiple hashtags per image. In fact, an Instagram post with eleven hashtags has been statistically proven to have the highest number of interactions.
Besides using industry-related hashtags, it is also important those that align with the Instagram culture. For instance, “throwback Thursdays” are routinely used by people to share old and nostalgic pics. Also, it is not exactly taboo to fish for likes and comments and some hashtags like #like4like or #tag4likes have been used more than 150 million times till date. Other prominent hashtags include #instadaily, #instalike, #igers (for “Instagrammers”), #picoftheday and these tags work really well to drive up engagement and bring new leads to your business since a lot of users surf through tags as these.
Images which demonstrate benefit
Images have the power to draw visitors in and they need to make a good first impression while communicating the brand benefit. While this is easy to accomplish for brands with physical products, those without them can demonstrate benefit just as effectively. For example, a software firm can take images of their office environment or provide a sneak-peek look at an upcoming update. However, image quality should always be high while maintaining consistency in order to establish branding. This sets the scene for your brand to be instantly recognized and makes a good first impression to hook a visitor.
Use call-to-actions strategically
While visual content reigns supreme in capturing attention, there is an opportunity to complement it with text to ensure visitors take a specific action. Use this space wisely to complement an image with a benefit-driven description that encourages a visitor to click on a link leading them to a highly targeted landing page. For example, a software agency might use “install now” as a call-to-action after showing a compelling picture of their product in use.
If you are an advertiser on Instagram, you could choose from one of several call-to-action buttons like “Shop Now,” “Install Now” or “Sign up.” One study found that using these CTA buttons on your sponsored Instagram posts can drive up your click-through rates by as much as 6%. In addition to this, the “click to install” conversion rates rose by nearly 32% while the cost per installation improved by 12%.
Engage with the audience
Don’t just post images and disappear into the abyss without responding to comments or engaging with your audience and community. Instead, respond to comments frequently to increase exposure of your brand and the goodwill surrounding it. This ensures that when the time comes to make a purchase, your brand is high on the mind of people in your industry. Furthermore, don’t limit yourself to interaction solely on your profile but branch out and look for brands which post similar content similar and engage in comments on their profile as well. Your comments should be informative and raise awareness about your brand’s latest offerings or upcoming events.
A photo-sharing site may not be the first thought that comes to mind when lead generation is mentioned. A study conducted a couple of years back found that just over a quarter of businesses used Instagram to generate leads. But it would be foolhardy to underestimate the power of this medium. With more than 600 million monthly active users, Instagram is a powerful medium to communicate your brand value and generate leads. After all, a visual medium that users can reach out while on the move is most ideal to generate interest for your products and services.
