Instagram for Business – Paid

Once you have started to post to Instagram organically and gained a small following, you will begin to understand what works and what doesn’t work when trying to reach your target audience. This is the perfect time to begin to make use of Pay Per Click advertising. This can be a mind field to understand, so we thought it might be helpful to share a few insights to get you started.

You may be aware that Instagram are owned by Facebook. You will therefore you will need to create a Facebook Ads Manager account in order to manage your ads from creation to evaluation.

1. Once you have created your Ad Manager account you can begin to think about the aim of your advert. It is better if the advert is part of a wider campaign and adds value to what you are currently doing as a pose to having a stand alone advert that is not aligned with your overall brand message. If this is something you have never done before, consider taking an hour out of your day to think about the core values of your business and start to create a ‘personality’ that your customers will want to engage with.

2. The next step in creating a successful Instagram is to understand your target market. Whilst your business may have a varied customer base, it is important to further segment the market, as this will ensure you are reaching the consumers specific wants and needs. The best way to segment the market is by profiling your customer, click here for templates.
3. Now it is time to create the content you want to advertise – there are lots of helpful tips on Instagram for Business that will help you understand the most successful way to market as well as a dedicated area displaying the campaigns from some of the best accounts on Instagram that can be used to draw inspiration (remember original content that aligns with your brand will always be better than a copy-cat of a bigger brand, but there is no harm in looking for a bit of inspiration from the people who really know what they are doing)
4. Follow the steps on the Ad Manager – Now it is time to create your ad. Ads Manager is a great, simple to use tool that guides you through the process one step at a time. There are lots of options to choose from when decided the objective for your ad, from traffic to your website to lead generation and everything in between, this will allow you to match your business aim to the aim of the running campaign in order to see the best result. At this stage it is worth noting that you cannot advertise solely on Instagram, instead you will have to allow your ad to run through both Facebook and Instagram.
5. Ensure you continue to track and measure the success of your campaign at all times to ensure you are achieving the results you desire.

6. Once the campaign is finished, evaluate the success through the available tools on Ads Manger, you will be able to see the reach V’s the amount of click through to name just a few features. Remember you may not see the results you want straight away but they will come. Each time you put out a campaign you are likely to see more and more results as you get better and better at creating the ad.