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Selling on Instagram and Making the Most of It

September 2, 2016 By Ahmad Raza 9 Comments

Perhaps it’s been a long day. Perhaps you’re on your way to work. Or maybe work is getting a little too boring. You probably turn to Instagram to find something interesting and funny, right?

Instagram is the distraction of choice for most people.

Selling on Instagram

In fact, in a recent study from Facebook IQ and Ipsos Connect, lead researcher Vicki Molina-Estolano says:

People surveyed who use both platforms (Facebook and Instagram) more often agreed that Instagram surprises and delights them than Facebook

If people are on Instagram to see things that amaze and inspire them, wouldn’t the appearance of an ad make the user experience worse? No.

For example, WIRED reports that photographer Arnold Daniel had incredible success creating a call-to-action. He got $15,000 in orders from simply asking his Instagram followers to buy his pictures on his birthday.

Here are a few tips to help you sell on Instagram too.

Table of Contents

    • 1. Display isolated product photos, without a person.
    • 2. Make your Instagram shoppable with a clear call to action.
    • 3. Filters are great, but filter-free posts sell better on Instagram.
    • 4. User Generated Photos are important.
    • 5. Influencer marketing + Instagram sponsored Ads
  • Selling on Instagram in a Nutshell
      • Ahmad Raza
      • Latest posts by Ahmad Raza (see all)

1. Display isolated product photos, without a person.

Which approach works better—posting your product images only or posting a picture of someone holding the product?

Michael Thomason is a respected marketing analyst for Simply Measured. He analyzed the Simply Measured Q4 2014 Instagram Study and found that consumers actually prefer isolated product pictures, as opposed to humans holding or showing off the products.

Or let’s look at it from another angle. If I open Instagram and follow Kevin Hart (a popular comedian), it’s obvious I want to see more of him. And if I follow Justin Bieber, I’m basically in love with his music and want to see more of him, right? Yes.

But what if I follow something like leading fashion brand Lacoste? What do I hope to get from that company? Its products. Not the CMO, the employees, or a model hired for a photo shoot.

I know Lacoste is a company that sells something that interests me. So I follow it with the intent to see its products.

Here’s a typical product-only sample from Sigma Beauty, which is an international cosmetics company:

Of course, there are some products that require a person to be in the photo; otherwise they won’t present well.

For example, take this post from American-based retailer Deep South Pout:

If the picture only showed the dress, the product wouldn’t look as presentable as it does now. If you’re selling clothes on Instagram, you want to show people how beautiful they look on a real human.

2. Make your Instagram shoppable with a clear call to action.

With a shoppable Instagram, consumers can easily click a link in your bio and land on a product page. That page will show them your products just as you display them on Instagram.

Here’s how Shabby Apple—a leading women’s clothing brand—does it:

One great tip you can learn from Shabby Apple here is that they use a clear CTA: “Shop our Instagram feed.” This way, consumers understand they can easily shop what they see on the company’s Instagram feed without having to search the web for it.

Less stress equals higher profits.

3. Filters are great, but filter-free posts sell better on Instagram.

Social media scientist Dan Zarrella did some analysis on over 160,000 Instagram posts. He found that pictures without filters had the highest number of likes out of all the posts he examined. The one exception was the willow (black and white) filter, which got the most likes.

In other words, consumers prefer to see your real photos, rather than the ones you edited. They don’t like it when you appear to misrepresent your product. Here’s a typical no-filter post sample from Michael Kors, a leading sportswear fashion designer:

No filters at all-just the original picture. If the brand had used a filter, the image probably wouldn’t have gotten the 11.9k likes in less than 17 minutes after posting. At least, according to Dan Zanrella’s analysis, it wouldn’t have.

So the more filter-free posts you put on Instagram, the more engagement, Instagram traffic and leads you stand to gain.

4. User Generated Photos are important.

You can have promises that sound good. You can tell consumers that your products will make their mountains become valleys or make their problems melt like ice in the sun. But your customers will still want to see evidence from other consumers that your product really provides the solutions you’re promising.

And this is where User Generated Content (or consumer photos) comes in. Below is a typical sample from Vanity Planet. Vanity Planet is a fashion brand using Yotpo’s new visual commerce platform to integrate customers’ Instagram photos to their product pages:

According to a Search Engine Land survey, 88% of consumers say they trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations. So reviews alone can be enough to convince consumers to buy your product. However, when you display those reviews alongside user generated photos of your products, you engage customers better.

“We ran a survey of 1000 eCommerce shoppers and 77% said that authentic photos from customers affect their purchase decisions more than professional photos from stores do,” says Doug Baltman, who does Product Marketing at Yotpo.

5. Influencer marketing + Instagram sponsored Ads

84% of consumers say that they trust people they know over direct advertising, according to a Nielsen study. That is, they trust influencers that they follow more than they trust sponsored ads.

When sportswear fashion designer Michael Kors first ran an Instagram ad for a watch, it got 94,000 likes and some really ugly comments in the first few hours.

Those negative comments mostly came from Instagram users who never followed Michael Kors, but were seeing their ads. They got annoyed by the blatant, unrelated promotion and lashed back at the company through their public comments.

Sponsored ads can help you reach a large audience and create a lot of brand awareness. That is the point of them. But influencer marketing helps you to engage consumers more effectively. Even though it can’t reach all the users that sponsored ads can, it can help to cut down the negative backlash from advertising.

A mixture of both influencer marketing and sponsored ads is key to helping you achieve your desired advertising results on Instagram. Francis Trapp, CEO of Brandnew, puts it this way in a post on AdWeek: “The best strategy would be to use the best of both worlds to maximize results.”

Selling on Instagram in a Nutshell

With a community of over 500 million users, Instagram continues to be a highly engaging and effective marketing platform. Both large and small businesses can use the tips above to sell on it successfully.

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Ahmad Raza

Ahmad is an MBA graduate of good humor and intelligence who hails from London. When he is not writing about technology and startups, he can be found traveling to some of the most thrilling places on earth.
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Latest posts by Ahmad Raza (see all)

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Filed Under: Small Business Advice Tagged With: b2c social media, instagram, sell services

Comments

  1. Rachel says

    October 16, 2018 at 2:22 am

    Hello, Ahmad. This article is something that I will now refer! Indeed Instagram is a giant community and its numbers are growing daily. So why don’t create a nice and welcoming account? Also a little tip, it might be obvious for most of the readers: it’s always better to work with the “organic” followers (At least someone will know about you). If you don’t have a graduated specialist to keep the ghost followers away or you have no time to do it by your self, help is on its way (something I use). https://zen-promo.com/instagram_ghosts_cleaning

    Reply
  2. S.W. says

    January 1, 2017 at 12:23 pm

    Great article. Instagram has really been underutilized from an ecommerce perspective, and it seems that big brands are only now catching up to it. Internet marketers have been making money off it for a while though

    Reply
  3. Vijay Kumar says

    September 13, 2016 at 12:26 pm

    Hi Raza,
    Thanks for this awesome article, You have well described this topic. I love Instagram for a long time. Thanks buddy for writing a post for Instagram.

    Reply
  4. George says

    September 7, 2016 at 5:47 am

    Thanks for sharing this great tips Ahmad. I agree customers prefer filter-free photos compared to edited photos of your product.
    George would love you to read ..TIME MANAGEMENT IN BPO COMPANIESMy Profile

    Reply
  5. qiwenxue says

    September 6, 2016 at 12:19 am

    Hello.Ahmad
    I am ready start my small business recently,But I am not good at English now.
    So I think It is a good idea selling on instagram.
    This post help me a lot. Thank you very much.
    qiwenxue would love you to read ..100-year impress: beginning with the metal holes of adapter board in ALICE/MOLLE systemMy Profile

    Reply
  6. Steve says

    September 5, 2016 at 9:02 am

    Hi Ahmad,

    I was surprised by the different performance of the filters and that photos without them perform best – thanks for the info! Making your Instagram feed shoppable is a very interesting approach and maybe the best one for the brands selling physical products and showcase them on Instagram. Mixing shoutouts and sponsored ads as well is a great solution, you could even promote a shoutout for even more reach this way.

    Reply
  7. Greg J. Herrera says

    September 3, 2016 at 6:10 am

    wow wonderful post thanks for the publishing and sharing with us……………………Awesome article it was exceptionally helpful I simply began in this and I’m becoming more acquainted with it better! cheers. keep doing awesome.

    thanks
    Greg J. Herrera would love you to read ..Best French Bread PizzaMy Profile

    Reply
  8. Leslie says

    September 3, 2016 at 5:47 am

    I have yet to use Instagram for my work. But I might just start after reading this article.

    Reply
  9. Golam Qauser says

    September 3, 2016 at 4:17 am

    Hi there,

    Thank you so much for writing about Instagram Marketing. Instagram is a growing social media marketing website. Now a days people get sell on Instagram. They just share image with hashtags. And its work awesomley.
    Golam Qauser would love you to read ..How to Remove Background from a Picture Using Photoshop ?My Profile

    Reply

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