In the age of social commerce, businesses’ Instagram content should go beyond generating brand and product awareness on social media feeds and attempt to prompt action by converting views in purchases. In which case, making sure product photos and videos produce engagement in the form of Likes and Comments becomes increasingly important.
This requires content creation and social media management that are both creative and strategic. Here are five ways to help you achieve just that, to boost engagement for your products on Instagram with the end goal of sales conversion:
Announce New Shopping Features and Provide How-To’s. The features on Instagram’s social commerce keep growing, and even without new updates, many people could be unaware of or unaccustomed with these features. This is why it is important to dedicate a post, a highlight, or even a Q&A session to guide your audience through it. Such helpful content will likely receive shares and saves, which contribute to your engagement rate. Other than that, such content can potentially increase comments as it gives room for questions and answers between you and your customers.
Above all, this is an important investment for the future of your business, because even though some customers are still willing to switch pages to your ecommerce site, a shorter shopping journey will more likely secure purchase. With social commerce, you can avoid things such as abandoned carts, therefore increasing your conversion rate.
Include Audiences in Content. Research showed that posting pictures of real customers using your product can increase engagement by as much as 30%. This is likely due to how our audiences feel more comfortable after knowing that we do take into account their interactions with our brand by reposting them or inserting them in our content plan in whatever way. Additionally, this creates a sense of community among your followers which is important if you want to ensure that your account does not come across as merely a sales promotion channel.
Increase Your Reach with Hashtags. With the new Instagram shopping features, a brand can have an increased possibility of discovery. For example, being featured on Explore. Naturally, being discovered includes strategizing your hashtags in order to be discovered by followers of hashtags and product searchers. Brands will benefit from researching their hashtags and evaluating them regularly. Instagram analytics tools will allow you to show high performing hashtags by your competitors and yourself to give you an idea of what trends are rising in your industry.
Chat with Buyers. Interact and answer questions as though you are in a physical store. Just because social commerce creates a practical platform for purchase, that does not mean consumers cannot experience the same treatment and services as they would in-person. Therefore, you will benefit from actively interacting and give the best service you can. This does not only increase trust from your consumers, but it also accustoms them to a social commerce experience and raises the likeliness for them to repeat purchase.
Partner with Influencers. A good content partnership with an influencer can go a long way in social commerce. In fact, it can include all the four previous points. You can interact with your consumers with creative and highly discoverable content. However, to optimize this you need to do a thorough and strategic research to choose the best influencer to represent your brand. In this competitive era, it is important to find an influencer with high return on investment. This influencer should be able to receive a healthy number of engagement and reach, while creating content that conveys your brand and products messages accurately.
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