The Beginner’s Guide To Instagram Advertising

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Creating organic reach on Instagram is no easy achievement. The Instagram algorithm can be a difficult one to crack. As such, you are competing with brands as well as other users on Instagram, to grow reaches and reactions to your content.

Organic content can only get you so far. You may need to invest in paid marketing so that you can better target your audiences and get them to take the wanted action.

If you are not familiar with Instagram advertising, you are in the right place. We’ve got a detailed guide on how you can properly advertise your brand on Instagram. So without much further ado, let’s get right into it!

Set Precise Goals

Be precise about what social media goals you want to accomplish while running your social media ads. Maybe you want to reach certain particular audience segments with your content, or maybe you want to drive more brand engagement on the platform. Identifying what you want to achieve with your ads is essential for developing a powerful advertising strategy.

Your social media goals will only help direct your strategy and give you precision on how to efficiently invest your time, money and resources into it. Once you are precise about what you want to accomplish with your Instagram presence, you can begin with planning out your ads marketing strategy.

Identify Your Target Audience

Advertising is all about sending your content to the right set of people on the platform. As such, having an accurately targeted audience can assist you to build an effective Instagram Ads campaign.

You can use a social media analytics tool to obtain audience insights on your organic content. Using this data, you can have a perspective as to which segments of the audience interact and engage with your content most. This information will guide you on how to build profitable Instagram ad campaigns while targeting audiences who are more inclined to engage with your content.

Choose Your Ads Format

Once you have established your Instagram ads objectives, you can continue by selecting an ads’ format model suitable for your brand. Instagram provides a variety of ad formats that you can utilize for building ad creatives.

Now we’ll go over each of the ad formats that Instagram provides. You can choose accordingly, as to which of these alternatives will work best for your business.

Stories’ Ads

You can manage Instagram stories’ ads to benefit from the full-screen canvas that this format allows. The great thing about Instagram stories’ ads is that these mix in with other organic stories that users share.

Focus on creating an Instagram stories’ ad featuring a memorable, original and relevant call to action. You can also add links to your stories with this ad format.

Photo Ads

As the name suggests, these are simple Instagram ads featuring photos of your brand or products. These are static ad creatives with a single photo and a call to action button based on the purpose of your ad.

Video Ads

Showcase your products in action, project your brand story or do a gripping commercial-like video Ad. Video ads can turn out to be decisive for your brand. In a minute-long video, you can attract your audiences and convince them to take action.

Carousel Ads

With this format, you can add more than a single photo or video in one Instagram ad post. The audience can go through the different photos or videos you post on your Instagram handle. Leverage the Instagram carousel format to add multiple layers to a single ad campaign.

Collection Ads

Choose Collection Ads if you want to provide a dynamic experience to your target audience. With collection ads, your audience can find, browse and purchase your products on the platform.

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How To Create Instagram Ads

By now you must have already gathered a bunch of ideas for your Instagram ads. But before you pick an ad format for your campaign, you should learn how to design ads for your brand on Instagram.

To create an ad on Instagram, you can choose from the following two pathways:

  • Use the Facebook Ads manager
  • Use Instagram

Further, we will focus only on the process of creating Instagram Ads using Instagram.

Designing Ads On Instagram

To build ads on Instagram, you will need to activate the business account. Once you have your Instagram business account, you can start running Ads and sponsored content.

You can boost the visibility to your top-performing posts and content on Instagram to a well-targeted audience. Employing a good Instagram Analytics tool can help you discover which of your Instagram posts did well. You can then promote these posts on the Instagram App.

Following this, you can allow Instagram to select a default audience. The other alternative is to create a special audience for your ad post based on selected demographics, targeted interests, and location.

Once you’ve selected your target audience, you may choose the budget and duration. Now, you’re all set to start running your ads.

So far, we’ve covered all the technical features of creating Instagram ads. But if you aspire to generate maximum attention on your ads, you will need to be loaded with the best quality ad creatives and copies. So, let’s proceed with the next step in creating great Instagram advertising.

Build Engaging Ad Creatives

The visuals of your Instagram ads present an essential role in grabbing the audience’s attention. Instagram creatives can make or break your advertising strategy.

Your ad content should have the ability to blend in with the rest of the organic content. It shouldn’t seem to be too commercial and must have an organic appeal to it.

Using a great photo-editing or video editing tool can assist you in ensuring that your content stands out for all the right reasons.

Add a relevant copy to your content that urges your audience to stop and check out your content.

Write Engaging Ad Copies

Your ad copy is as indispensable (as an element of your ad) as the creative. Without great copy to back it up, your ad will seem incomplete. The right copy can help lead your audience to the action that you need them to take.

Since you are not able to put in too much information in your ad creative, you need to use this space appropriately and smartly, to create a caption that stands out.

A polished Instagram advertising copy includes a call to action that completes your ad. Always check for grammar and spelling errors before finalizing an ad caption.

Bottom Line

Given the remarkably competitive platform that Instagram is, leaning only on organic content is not always going to be enough. To accomplish your business goals on Instagram, you will need to produce a powerful advertising marketing strategy for your brand.

So, what are you waiting for? Contact us to get started with your Instagram ads’ marketing plan, today!

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