Social media platforms are powerful tools, but they can also become a waste of your company’s time if they’re not executed properly. I believe even the most ordinary, uninteresting and/or boring brands can implement appealing, engaging and successful social media accounts.
Last year, Instagram had its largest growth spurt ever. The app expanded its user base from 700 million in April 2017 to 800 million by September 2017. Out of all these (almost a billion) users, 500 million were daily active users … Are we dependent, or what?
Here are four tips to powerful Instagramming and proof even pretty mundane brands can effectively engage users by practicing these pointers:
Share Fantastic and Original Content
Instagram is a photo- and video-sharing platform, so obviously, the objective is to share appealing, vivid and one-of-a-kind images, videos and graphics. This might require investing in photo editing tools like Adobe Photoshop Lightroom or graphic design websites like Canva.
3M, a global science company, is a great example of sharing attractive content. Though its bio doesn’t sound very captivating, and many people might not know what 3M even does, the company has found a way to engage Instagram users by posting unique and colorful photos and videos of the company’s inventions.
Exercise a Consistent Theme
Every brand should practice a steady theme across its social media platforms. The visual content should be logical in relation to the brand and previous posts.
Merriam-Webster, a publishing company especially known for its dictionary resources, adequately practices this consistency on Instagram. Merriam-Webster posts a word of the day every single day, and the layout of these posts are always the same. Posting every day is probably too often for most brands, but for Merriam-Webster, it works.
Practice Posting Balance
Balance is key on social media. Find an adequate balance between posting and taking time off. Your followers want to have a relationship with you, and any good relationship requires mutual respect. So, respect your followers by not oversharing. A good way to determine if you’re posting too often is if you’re losing significant amounts of followers. This could be a sign you’re being … well, annoying.
General Electric, an innovation company, does a great job of balancing its posts. GE consistently posts on Instagram – usually with a Monday/Wednesday/Friday combo, occasionally with a Tuesday/Thursday combo, and sometimes (rarely) on the weekends. This uniformity suggests the GE social media team schedules their posts using a social media content calendar. In my opinion, two to four Instagram posts per week is ideal for most brands.
Create Clever Captions with a Consistent Voice
Coming up with clever captions should require some serious thought. It’s always a good idea to ask for second opinions. You must also be sure to create captions with a voice that is exclusive to your brand’s personality. By voice, I mean the tone of the captions and copy on the graphics should be compatible with the brand’s personality. For instance, your brand’s voice should not be serious and formal one week, but casual and slang-ish the next. You should constantly execute the established identity of your brand.
H&R Block, a tax preparation company, provides a great example of this on its Instagram account. Not only is the visual theme tenaciously green, but the captions are routinely short, witty and on-brand.
Check out all these accounts to discover how they’re executing some of Instagram’s best practices. Additionally, you can access Freestyle Creative’s social media portfolio here.
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