10 Myths about Instagram Marketing
Over the last 12 years since inception of our digital agency in 2010 (prior to our re-branding), we've receive questions both in our client meetings and workshop participants who have attended our Social Media and Instagram Marketing Courses.
We've compiled the top 10 Instagram Marketing Myths that we have commonly heard in the last 2 years for you in this blog post, and share our thoughts on these myths in this blog post below.
Let's learn together!
These are our thoughts, and we'll try to share our view as much as we can on this the following myths below. If you're still curious or have a burning question for us, let's connect over on our Instagram! Our IG handle @skydigitalagency - or you may click on any of our IG post and let's get connected!
The secret of success is to do the common thing uncommonly well. - John D. Rockefeller Jr.
Top 10 Myths about Instagram Marketing (have you heard of them?)
1) Instagram Marketing is not for my business
2) My customers are not on Instagram
3) Instagram is for young people only
4) Instagram is for B2C businesses only. Not effective for B2B businesses.
5) Instagram Marketing is not effective for my business, and it does not drive bottom-line results
6) Instagram Marketing does not have actionable metrics to measure
7) Instagram Follower Count is KEY
8) The fewer the Hashtags, the better!
9) I need to post daily on Instagram to see results
10) You should only post on Instagram on weekdays
Instagram Myth 1: Instagram Marketing is not for my business
I do understand that there are some industries who find it difficult to share a "social" side to their business. But social is one of the greatest ways to create brand awareness, and with millennials as decision makers in many organizations today, Instagram is one platform you should consider as it has greater discoverability compared on Facebook.
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Busting Myth #1, #2 and #3 - As majority of the users on Instagram are aged 18 to 44 years old, it will be weird for a business to claim that their customers are not on Instagram, and that Instagram is not for their business.
There are many B2B businesses using Instagram for: Behind the Scenes, The Team making things Possible, User-Generated Content, Engage With Followers, Commenters, Post Images That Highlight Information and Data (infographics), and Videos!
Myth #4 and #5 - Some B2B businesses such as MailChimp, HubSpot, IBM, General Electric, Shopify are on Instagram, and using it to reach out to their audiences who might be founders, entrepreneurs and business owners!
The importance is to know how being social helps to humanize our companies/brands, and making us more relatable. It also allows us to hear from our customers a little more informally, and drive insights with polls and many other features available on Instagram.
Instagram is a great platform and tool to drive traffic to your offers and landing pages, especially for tech-based B2B companies, and the cost per link click based on interest and behaviours cost less than $3-$4 across most industries.
Myth #6 - Instagram Marketing does not have actionable metrics to measure
Although there are many metrics to track on Instagram. Indeed some metrics might not say or do much for a brand or business. There are 3 actionable metrics that I would like to share with you today.
More about Actionable Metrics on Instagram!
Actionable Metrics 1: Profile Views
If you have little to no profile views, challenge yourself to make a post that people would bother to click through and visit your profile. This will give you an indication on 2 key things. Firstly, when people see your post, does it interest them to check your profile out. Secondly, you can look into calculating your profile visit to follower count ratio. Profile views can give us an idea if the content was what our audiences are looking for (though it requires visually appealing visuals/graphics, strategic hashtags consistently).
Actionable Metrics 2: Bio Link Clicks
Out of 10 post, we would have approximately 2-4 posts where we would like our followers to take action. This will be a good indication if you have an attractive CTA for your audience to click through on your bio link.
Actionable Metrics 3: Follower Count (although we do not prioritize this, it is still a good actionable metric)
Here's my view on Follower Count. There should constantly be awareness of your content in front of the right audience you want to attract to you. When you have weekly growth (even though it is slow growth), this is a good indicator that you have content that your audience are looking for, and they follow you so as not to miss out on your content!
Myth #7 - Instagram Follower Count is KEY
Well, having less than 100-300 followers may not put a business in a great light, but with Instagram, it is not difficult to grow your followers with the help of paid advertising in the span of 3-4 months if you adopt an Instagram Marketing Strategy.
Your Instagram Marketing Strategy will need:
a) Content Pillars on Instagram - Topical or Themed based Content
b) Content Frameworks - FAQs, Fun Facts, Statistics, Infographics, Behind the Scenes, etc
c) Regular Schedule of showing up 3 times a week
d) HashTag Research for Discoverability and Growth
e) Budget to promote Best performing content!
Myth #8 - The fewer the Hashtags, the better!
Hashtags are essential for discoverability. Even though some big accounts use 0 to 3 hashtag(s), this is not recommended because every post can use up to 30 hashtags, and you should use at least 20 hashtags so as to improve the chances of your content getting discovered!
“It’s not the best content that wins. It’s the best promoted content that wins.” – Andy Crestodina
“Content builds relationships. Relationships are built on trust. Trust drives revenue.” – Andrew Davis
Myth #9 - I need to post daily on Instagram to see results
The quotes above, help to bring context to Myth #9: We do not need to post daily on Instagram to see results! What we need is to promote our best content. Not just any content, but our best content. With good content being promoted (aka advertised on Instagram), more people get to know about you and who you are. Good content will build relationships, and relationships build trust. Trust then drives us revenue.
Myth #10 - You should only post on Instagram on weekdays
For many non-retail businesses, this might be true. However, always test this! We're posting at least once on a weekend monthly, just to make sure we still show up to audiences who might use Instagram more on a weekend than a weekday.
Every tip shared by a Instagram Expert is of their own experience with Instagram, replicating their system might or might not work for everyone. So always test it out for yourself!
Here's a webinar video to watch on "What is Instagram Marketing" that we have conducted for small business owners whom have attended our Facebook Marketing and Email Marketing courses previously... You'll find some helpful tips be strategic in your social media content and hashtags usage.
If this blog has been helpful, remember to check us out on our Instagram and YouTube!
IG: https://www.instagram.com/skydigitalagency/
YouTube: https://youtube.com/skydigitalagency
