Instagram has changed entirely in 2020 to a huge marketing channel for Ecommerce business owners. Instagram was introduced as the photo-sharing app that consisted of selfies, photos of food, pets, memes, etc. in its early stage of development. But now it has become the biggest platform to drive traffic and convert more sales. 

In the past few years, Instagram has made lots of changes and introduced new features that help brands and business owners to decide what works and whatnot. Instagram has included some advanced features like insights for post and story analytics, Shoppable Instagram posts and stories, and a new IGTV that helps drive traffic to your store. 

Most Ecommerce brands fail on the platform due to the fact that they directly want to engage customers in buying. This strategy does not work at all. To get the most out of the Instagram feeds, stories and IGTV, you should know the ins and outs of the platform. 

It would be best if you had an idea of how people on Instagram interact with brands like yours. Find your USPs and try to maximize the use of infotainment pictures and videos in your posts in every way. 

This guide describes how you can use the three primary ways to share the infotainment posts and videos that can benefit your Ecommerce store. 

First, understand that all of the three formats are different in nature, and they have their uniqueness that makes Instagram a great tool to use to drive more traffic and sales. 

How to use Instagram feeds to benefit your Ecommerce:

First things first, know what kind of images and videos you can post on Instagram feed. Here you have to do a trial and error or A/B testing to figure out which post gets more engagement. 

Don’t use one type fits all strategy or one themed posts on your feed. This is a sure way to drive people away from you. Make use of what your competitors are doing in terms of engaging people. 

The audience on Instagram is very open to seeing motivational pictures, memes, DIY, tutorial videos, promotional posts and all sorts posts. 

Make use of social media marketing tools that help you automate your content marketing on Instagram. This saves you from the trouble of promoting your content every day. Also, plan out the daily posts on Instagram for at least a month or two in advance. This will save you the hassle of finding the content every day. 

One of the best ways to get more people engaged in your post is by using the relevant hashtags in your posts. Instagram, by default, allows you to use max 30 hashtags in a single post. Using hashtags has become a strategy of on its own. Recently, Instagram has included an option to follow the hashtags. So, when you use the relevant hashtags, it has chances to appear to those people who follow those hashtags.

And if nothing works then, you always have the option to use the paid ad service provided by Instagram, or if you have a budget to hire an influencer, then that will be a significant boost to reach more audiences. 

Once you start to get a more prominent audience, you can use tools that can integrate Instagram with the products of your store. You can also show the images of your Instagram feeds on your Ecommerce store. 

How to use Instagram stories to benefit your Ecommerce:

Story feature of Instagram to share the images, posts and videos has become more attractive. This is where things start to be more creative. Since its introduction in 2017, it has become a prominent strategy for businesses. According to the Instagram states, more than 65% of businesses are planning to create more stories.

Due to its ephemeral nature, Instagram won’t charge you for posting too many stories, unlike the case of Instagram feeds. Stories can stay up for 24 hours, or you can save them as a highlight, which can be seen in your Instagram bio at any time. 

It would be best if you were careful about posting tons of stories because it can give a bad impression of you to your users. If your content is rich and engaging, then sharing 10+ stories in a day can be beneficial for you. 

Also, the frequency of posting stories do matter, but there is no optimal frequency for posting. You can share 10+ stories in a day, or you can stick to a few stories for a week, whichever works best for you. 

When it comes to what you should post in stories, it is also good to mix it up with infotainment, funny, and promotional posts. There are so many tools available on Instagram itself that you can use to show the creative and goofier side of your simultaneously. 

Keep track of your stories which gets lots of engagement with an inbuilt analytics tool, because it is super important to track what your audience most responds to. When you start to get higher views and engagement, it signals to the Instagram algorithm that your stories have good content. And the chances of your stories showing up first and to be seen by more people increases. 

How to use the Instagram IGTV to benefit your Ecommerce:

Despite being only a few months old, IGTV has got more popularity. To use this format for sharing content, you need to download a separate app from your App Store or Play Store. Also, with the IGTV app, you can directly share the videos as your stories as well.

You can use this platform to share how to’s and tutorials, promote your products, news, events and much more. Most of the vloggers and influencers have already started on this platform and treat it as the next YouTube-like platform. 

From a business perspective, it is essential to provide value to your audience through this medium of content sharing. And Business with less than 10,000 followers on Instagram will be able to put links on the IGTV videos.

IGTV was basically designed to share vertical videos, but it has included an option to share horizontal videos as well. Also, It works in continuity with your Instagram account, so all your IGTV videos will be synced to your account automatically. 

To leverage and capture the attention of your followers, use the most unique format of the platform to create highly engaging videos. Some of the best content ideas that can be put to use are,

• Giving inside looks and highlights of your brand,
• Share something new every day, 
• Make Q&A sessions regularly, and 
• Vlogging is the best. 

To get more views on this format, you can repost it as a feed post and as a story, optimize the title and description of the videos, and use eye-catching thumbnail Images.

Overview:

So, Instagram has expanded its growth since it’s started back in 2010. It has introduced new ways and features to share valuable content. All you need to do is come up with a strategy to use all the features in a way to drive more visitors to your store. 

You don’t need to use them all at once but plan out the strategy for a month or two in advance so that you don’t have to go through the trouble of coming up with ideas every day. 

Also, take care that the post you share should be visually attractive and eye-catching to the users. Be as creative as you can be to share content on the story and IGTV formats.