Welcome to Instagram: Insert Ad

Instagram Advertising opens its doors from a system very similar to Facebook. Instagram has grown in a meteoric way: from 50 million monthly users in 2012, to 100 million in February 2013 and 400 million users in September this year. 75% of these users comes from outside the United States, and it is already used by 55% of the Millennials. This huge opportunity has not been wasted and more than 70% of American companies have placed a campaign on Instagram. But, are they doing it right? Instagram is conscious of how intrusive an ad can be, so they promise coherence and quality to offer an interesting content well designed for users with a potential interest. This way, the intrusion level is reduced and users strengthen links with brands.  97% of the campaigns generated a significant lift in ad recall, using Instagram resources in a great way. With Facebook’s growth, Instagram ads will evolve to new formats, that already include larger video posts. The main goal is becoming the second bigger digital ads platform of the world after Google.

Now that we know all this, we are ready to prepare our advertising post.

Step 1: Choosing a picture.

A picture is worth a thousand words, and in Instagram the meaning of this sentence is multiplied.

First of all, the picture must have a great quality, and could be edited and treated with an editor.

Even though it is a promoted publication that seeks for attention, we can not forget the visual aesthetic of our brand, that will make customers remember us and integrate us into their imaginary.

It maybe sounds obvious but the picture we choose must be related to what we want to promote. If I am a glasses brand, I probably will not choose a picture of a landscape, even if I can justify it with my text, because the picture is the first thing we see and we must look for brand recall. The ideal thing would be choosing a picture of our product, space or service, presented in an original way, that adds value and if possible, that shows our potential customers using it.

Step 2: Copywriting

Although the picture predominates, the text in our Instagram ads must be clear and concise, and can not generate doubts. It exists the option of integrating our text in the picture, thanks to the already mentioned editors. In this case, this text will be specially short and direct.

If we decide to write our text in the main comment, we can write till 3000 characters and offer as many details as we want, but if it is too long, users may not read our message. Even so, we must avoid explaining everything. This way, our target will feel curiosity and will look for us on their own initiative.

About the offer in the ad, it must be clear and unique. Focus on showing the benefit of your product or service and limit the offer by days or units in order to create urgency.

Apart from the main comment, in Instagram we have ad support texts. These ones are: the page description, where we can make a special mention related to the ad, a link in our profile that leads to the main page or product page, and the comments, because it is so important that users receive feedback to their comments, to strengthen the relation with the brand.

Step 3: To whom?

So that your ad will be useful, you must direct it to a public interested in your brand or product, you must know your target. If you have decided to start making advertising on Instagram, you probably have already used segmentation for advertising in other networks, so you will have part of this work done. All your work will be for nothing if you direct your advertising to the wrong users. It is very important to investigate about their interests, location, or any other parameter that can improve sales and engagement. In addition, to optimize the results of your campaign, you can use custom audiences. That means impacting a first group of Facebook or Instagram users and prepare the second impact based on the first results. If the first time you impact 500.000 people with your ad but just 200.000 interact with it, the second impact will be directed to this group, which you have already caught the attention and will be more likely to interact and show interest in the brand.

Step 4: Budget

How much will it cost? How can I get a personalized budget? Advertising on Instagram works with the same system as Facebook advertising. The minimum spend is 1 daily dollar. At the beginning of the planification of the campaign it must be indicated if the budget is daily or total, the maximum available to invest, the bidding (cost per click or cost per impression) or the target. It all will determine the number of people you can reach. Before publishing it, you can make a simulation to see the potential reach of your campaign. After it, indicating your budget and a calendar of the campaign, you will receive the approximated daily reach.

Here you can see some good and bad examples of Instagram advertising.

Ice cream brand Ben&Jerry’s is creating quality advertising on Instagram, showing its product in a creativy way, playing with shapes and taking photos that consumers could take and share. It creates proximity to the brand and is integrated in the social network.

The same happens with Jasper’s Market. The food shop shows its products in a creative way, even elaborating dishes with it. Food photography is so delicate but if you know how to do it right we can obtain results as yummy as these ones.

In these three cases we can also see value advertising integrated in Instagram. The first picture, from Gillt, shows different products of the brand in a good distribution that any blogger could have used and provides ideas for users who see it. In Marvel Champions’ case, they promote a new game and show one of its scenes. This way we can see the graphics and one of the challenges they propose while playing. Finally, W Hotels surprises with this location, because it does not show one of their hotels, but the location with an original and good-quality picture.

This is what we were talking about when we said that food pictures are dangerous. If the result is as disgusting as this one, you won’t attract many customers and you can lose the ones you already have and waste your money.

No, definitely no. Neither Lexus nor Crown Resorts adapt to this new advertising. Lexus provides a picture of one of their stunning cars, but that’s all. The don’t add value, they don’t provide useful information, they don’t allow interaction. Good picture, bad advertising. Crown Results promotes a bad quality picture. We don’t know where it is, nor the activity played there, and it is not explained in the main comment. Although they have a call to action button, not many will be curious to know more about it.

Now that you know more about Instagram Advertising, don’t hesitate and start your campaign, obviously, in Adsmurai.