How to Use Instagram for Local Businesses

Instagram has over 800 million active users. Businesses have ample opportunity to market their products here on Instagram and gain an engaged and targeted audience without spending a lot of money on paid advertising. The best part about Instagram as of January 2018 this year is that a third-party platform, Sendible, allows you to post photos on that Instagram’s business profile, thus making it easily visible.

Here are a few tips for using Instagram perfectly for local businesses:

Make Your Bio Extraordinary

Certain people understand that your business is in their local area to find your bio. Include a short description of the location. Space is limited so write perfectly what you do and who you are. Provide an excellent quality bio image. Personal pictures for the profile will work better if your logo is truly recognizable.

Your bio place allows you to create hyperlinks to your website, so make links that fit your goals. Increase traffic by placing your link and give people a reason to click!

Hashtags

Hashtags are key to a wider audience. Develop a list of popular hashtags specific to your location and industry. Hashtags that make sense and associate your brand will result in more engagement and increase likes and followers on your profile, plus if your profile is new you can give it an initial boost by buying some likes or followers from the sites.

• Share Local Images: Engage your customers with local images, even with hashtags. This helps you easily connect with your followers.
• Use quality images: A well-known fact is that Instagram was the first image sharing network and hence uploads quality images captured by DSLR or Smartphone. Make sure the photos are about your local business.
• Note: Add hashtags in the comment section of your post instead of the description.

Have a Theme

Your Instagram account should not appear as some jumbled account with random photos. To make it look real, have a theme so that your brand is recognized and the images are consistent. Add your images on time and don’t forget to edit your content!

Having a theme doesn’t mean all your images have to be promotional. Remember, this is your business account on Instagram that works as a social store. It should state why you are here and the local business you do.

Tools and Resources

Grow your Instagram account with these tools and resources:

• Hootsuite: Plan your posts ahead of time. This is a great tool to help you plan your posts and you can also save hours by publishing prepared captions and images instantly.
• Canva: If you want to add fancy effects or some text to an Instagram post, this desktop site is Canva. The advantage is that it is very simple to use. Currently not available on mobile devices; but if you work at the computer all day, it can be easy to design posts.
• Typorama: This is an easy-to-use application and allows you to add images and text. The advantage is that it offers a wide selection of stock images and cool backgrounds to choose from. In fact, you can even add watermark to your images in the pro version. That’s great, but you have to make sure the company’s logo or name appears in the images. This will keep your local business running.
• Snapseed: The phone app provides editing. Available for Apple and Android devices.
• Iconosquare: You can use this tool and track metrics specific to your account. Of course, this takes a monthly fee, but it actually depends on the details you want to report.
• Analyze: This is a fascinating start as a simple tool for reporting. You’ll show quarterly reporting on their logs and easily track their follower count, comments and likes, and know how they’re trending.
• Instasize: This is a mobile editing app that lets you edit directly from your phone. Instasize lets you choose from professionally designed filters, text styles and borders to edit your photos and videos. It integrates seamlessly with Instagram and works great for those who want to create a consistent brand aesthetic.

Since it’s your local business promotion you use Instagram, make sure to include your location so it allows geotagging your posts and you’re easy to find. Add your location to each image. Check out this great tool for Small Business Blogs.