Do you want to advertise on Instagram to build your business?
Want to make potential customers more aware of your products or services on Instagram?
Wish to increase product sales, mobile app downloads, drive visitors to your website?
With a potential audience of more than half a million, Instagram ads are a key tool for any social media marketer.
In this post, we will walk you through everything you need to know about how to advertise on Instagram in just a couple of taps.
Let’s begin!
What Is Instagram Advertising?
Instagram advertisements are posts or Stories that a business pays to promote to users’ Instagram feeds. They look just like regular Instagram posts but are always identified by a “Sponsored” label. It can also include a call-to-action button to drive traffic.
Why you should advertise on Instagram
Instagram is growing and it is growing fast.
It offers incredible opportunities for businesses of all sizes to reach their target audiences without any extra effort.
Why is an Instagram advertisement so popular? Here are a few reasons:
- Audience growth: Instagram is one of the fastest-growing social media platforms. Brands across all industries saw a 100 % median follower growth.
- Attention: Users on average, spends 50 minutes a day on Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger.
- Intent: About 60% of Instagram users say that they learn about products and services through Instagram, and 75% say that they take actions such as visit sites, search, or tell a friend after seeing an Instagram post.
- Targeting: Instagram advertisements use Facebook’s advertising system, which has probably the most powerful targeting ability. You can specify your target audience’s location, demographics, interests, behaviours, etc. You can also target people who have bought from you or interacted with you.
Getting started with Instagram ads
There are five ways you can create and manage your Instagram ads:
- Within the Instagram app
- Facebook Ads Manager
- Power Editor
- Facebook’s Marketing API
- Instagram Partners
In this post, we will cover the first two since these are the simplest two among the five and the vast majority of businesses use these two to create Instagram ads.
How to advertise on Instagram from the app
The easiest way to advertise on Instagram is to promote an existing post. This mechanism is similar to the Boost Post option for Facebook ads.
If you have a post that is already performing well and getting lots of engagement, promoting it again within the app is a quick, easy method to reach even more users.
Then, simply navigate to your chosen post and then click Promote under the post.
Choose an existing Facebook Page or create a new one.
Simply complete the options to choose who will see your advertisement, where you want to send them, how much you want to spend, and for how long you want your advertisement to run.
Lastly, tap Create Promotion.
All done.
How to advertise using Facebook Ads Manager
Since Facebook owns Instagram, the advertising tools for these two platforms are well integrated. You can use Facebook Ads Manager to create an advertisement that runs on Instagram.
You can also monitor how your ads are performing.
If you do not have a Facebook Page yet, follow this step-by-step guide to set up Facebook Page here
Then, connect your Facebook Page and Instagram account to Facebook Business Manager.
Once you have got those preliminaries taken care of, it is time to dive into creating your first Instagram ad.
Step 1: Choose your objective
To start, go to Ads Manager and then click +Create.
There are two types of workflows that you can choose from to help you create and manage your Instagram advertisement. The default is Guided Creation, which walks you through the exact steps you should take to create a typical Instagram advertising campaign. Guided Creation is most helpful for newer marketers.
Quick Creation will give you more control in crafting your Instagram ad. You can click the Switch to Quick Creation button to use this workflow after you are well experienced with Ads manager.
Let us now talk about Guided Creation.
Firstly, you need to choose your ad campaign objective.
Once you have selected your objective, you will be prompted to name your campaign.
The default name will just be the objective you have selected but you may choose to give it a more specific name to help you keep track of your campaigns.
Step 2: Identify your audience
The next step is to decide who you want to target with your advertisement.
Since Instagram is owned by Facebook, you have access to a wide variety set of targeting options. These go beyond typical demographic information like age, gender, and location. It allows you to craft copy and messages that uniquely applies to your potential customer.
Step 3: Select your ad placements
In the Placements section, you can decide where your advertisements will appear on Facebook and Instagram.
You have two options for this:
- Automatic Placements. Your advertisements will be shown to your audience wherever they are likely to perform best.
- Manual Placements. You will be able to pick and choose where your ad appears.
Once you choose where you want your ads to go, then choose your budget.
Step 4: Choose your budget and schedule
You need to determine how much you want to spend on your promotion and for how long.
You can choose a daily budget, which offers a maximum daily spend, or a lifetime budget for an advertisement with a set lifespan. You can even choose to run ads continuously, or only at certain times of the day.
Facebook Ads Manager includes optimization and bid strategy options, which determines how your budget will be spent. These can be customized, depending on your campaign goal.
As you adjust these options, the Estimated Daily Reach scale in the right-hand column lets you know how many people you can expect to reach each day with your advertisements.
Step 5: Create your ads
Time to create the actual ad.
Start by choosing the format you want to use for your ad.
Things are fairly straightforward from here:
- Choose your pictures or videos
- Make your ad copy
- Pick a payment option to pay
- Review your advertisement
- Click Confirm
The Ads Manager will display the technical format requirements as you select your images or videos.
You can even choose a call-to-action button and the destination URL that people will reach when they click on it.
Once you have clicked Confirm. You have your first Instagram ad.
Types of Instagram ads
Instagram offers several ad formats:
- Stories ads
- Photo ads
- Video ads
- Carousel ads
- Collection ads
- Explore ads
- IGTV ads
- Instagram Shopping ads
Stories ads
Instagram Stories ads are full-screen ads that come in between users’ Stories.
You have the potential to reach a massive audience with your Instagram Story ads.
Brands take advantage of all Instagram Stories features, like adding face filters, video effects, and text to create fun and creative promotions.
Create a seamless experience for your users. The call-to-action takes the form of a swipe-up feature at the bottom of the Story ad.
Photo ads
Photo ads enable brands to showcase products and services through compelling images.
If you are already making top-notch visual content, Instagram photo ads give you the platform to share it with more and more people.
Video ads
Video ads on Instagram can be up to one minute long, so they give a chance to users to have a closer look at your brand, your business, or your products. Shorter videos can often be more effective, especially if you include branding in the first few seconds of the advertisement.
Carousel ads
Carousel ads let users swipe through a series of images or videos with a call-to-action button that connects them directly to your website.
You can use this to –
- Highlight multiple products
- Dive deep into a single service with images or videos
- Share a multi-part story
Collection ads
Instagram Collection ads offer e-commerce feature: Users have the option to purchase products directly from the advertisement. When users click on the ad, they are directed to an Instagram Instant Experience Storefront.
Instagram Explore ads
Explore is the part where users discover new content and accounts. More than half of Instagram users access Explore every week.
Explore ads do not appear in the grid or the topic channels. Instead, they appear after someone clicks on a photo or video from Explore.
IGTV ads
Instagram has recently announced that it will be offering advertising in IGTV. As this is a brand-new development, details of IGTV ads are now not yet clear, but video creators will receive 55% of the ad revenue.
Instagram Shopping ads
If you are setting up with Instagram Shopping, you can run various posts as Instagram ads.
Instagram Shopping ads take shoppers directly to a product description page within the app. They can then purchase through your mobile version of your website.
How to choose the best Instagram advertisement type
It is crucial to be intentional about your ad format. The big question you need to answer that will help you decide:
What is your goal?
Start by reviewing your marketing strategy. Then sit down to create some goals for your Instagram ads campaign.
Take a look at the objectives supported by each Instagram ad format. Think about how they can directly support your goals. Also, consider which types of content or post get the best response in your organic Instagram feed. Once you’ve placed a few Instagram ads, be sure to review them to track your success. You can then tweak your ad type choices to improve your Instagram advertising strategy over time.
Objectives:
- Brand awareness
- Conversions
- Engagement
- Lead generation
- Messages
- Reach
- Traffic
How much do Instagram ads cost?
Many factors impact the cost of your Instagram advertisements, including:
- targeting
- advertising placement
- advertising format
- time of year
It has been found that the average cost per click for most ad placements was $1.20.
You need to be clear about how much you want to spend, or how much you are willing to spend per result. You can do a little Instagram advertising with almost any budget.
You control your Instagram ads cost by setting a campaign spending limit, a daily budget, or a bid strategy.
Instagram ad tips and best practices
Here are some things to keep in mind while crafting an ad that engages and delights users.
Know your audience
When you really know your audience well, you will be able to craft messaging that connects with them. That is why it is so crucial to know your audience before you start to advertise on Instagram.
- What solution does your product/service offer them?
- Their need and desire
Keep their goals and values in mind as you create your ads.
Use text wisely
An image is worth a thousand word and that is a good thing because you cannot use that much text in your Instagram ads. You can use up to 2,200 characters for most Instagram ads, but only two rows of text will display without being cut off.
That means every character counts. Use the text wisely to advertise on Instagram. Connect with your audience and motivate them to click your CTA button.
Engage
You need to respond to comments on your ads just as you would on your organic posts.
In fact, it is more important to keep an eye out for engagements on ads, since you are likely to get comments and questions directly related to the product advertised.
Your response really makes the difference in driving purchases.
Test, measure, and optimize
As with Facebook ads you can view the performance of your Instagram ads in Facebook Ads Manager.
Keep an eye on your results to refine your strategy and get the most from your Instagram ads budget. Does “Learn more” convert better than “Shop now”? You have to use this wisely.
Instagram presents businesses with an opportunity to market their products to the targeted audience with these amazing advertising options. Whether your business strategy needs an update or you are a newcomer to this social media network, you will find these tips on how to advertise on Instagram for business superbly useful
About Us
Nexuses is a creative growth marketing agency, that helps companies scale up their business frugally by helping them acquire new clients, boost their brand and digital presence. At Nexuses we help companies unlock most promising customer acquisition channels and drive their ideal customers to their product or service at scale