Instagram Marketing: A Preface
When Instagram first popped onto the scene back in 2010, it had been a bit like the other social platform: crammed with selfies, pets, and pictures of food.

Fast-forward to 2019 and Instagram’s transformation from an easy photo sharing app to a full-on marketing channel is almost complete.

Just check out a number of the platform’s newest features! within the last year alone, Instagram has released dozens of latest tool for businesses, including advanced analytics, shoppable Instagram posts, and new ways to drive traffic from Instagram Stories, and therefore the new standalone video platform, IGTV.

Whether you're employed in ecommerce, education, or media and publishing, it pays to create a presence on Instagram. But if you actually want to urge ahead, you would like to understand the platform (and your audience) inside and out, including what quite content resonates most, the way to build an Instagram Stories strategy, and the way to trace your metrics and KPIs.

That’s where this guide comes in. within the next 16 chapters, we’ll walk you through:

The fundamentals of a well-rounded Instagram marketing strategy
Tips on the way to create an efficient Instagram profile
Running your first Instagram influencer marketing campaign
The ins and outs of your Instagram analytics
Tips on the way to use Instagram Stories for business
And so much more!

But first, let’s take a glance at why Instagram marketing is so effective for ecommerce businesses especially .Why Instagram Marketing is vital to Ecommerce Success
We all skills great Instagram is for sharing photos and videos with our friends and family, but it’s also a fantastic channel for ecommerce marketing. But why?

Well, a clear reason is Instagram’s format. due to this visual nature, Instagram holds massive opportunities for ecommerce businesses looking to showcase their products. Whether through regular photos, videos, or Instagram Stories, many businesses have learned that building a visible presence on Instagram can hugely compliment their ecommerce marketing.There’s also the very fact that Instagram users are more engaged than the typical social media user. And while trends do seem to point out that Instagram engagement is dropping (something we’ll be discussing within the next chapter), the platform remains producing higher engagement rates for businesses compared to both Twitter and Facebook.

But Instagram users are quite simply engaged -- they’re also commonly internet buyers . consistent with a recent study, 72% of Instagram users report making a sale decision after seeing something on Instagram, with the foremost popular categories being clothing, makeup, shoes, and jewellery .This shopping mindset makes Instagram users the right audience because they’re high-intent and quick to convert.

Another reason Instagram is so great for ecommerce has got to do with the platform itself. As we mentioned within the previous chapter, Instagram has recently introduced plenty of latest business-facing tools -- and there’s definitely more to come! Whether through links in Instagram Stories or shoppable Instagram posts, in time many of our online shopping experiences will start (and end) on Instagram.All of this said, it might be an error to think that simply because you don’t sell ecommerce products your business doesn’t belong on Instagram! Beyond its unique ability to maneuver products, Instagram is additionally a fantastic place for businesses to create brand awareness and connect with new audiences (and potential customers).

Of course, if you would like to create an Instagram marketing strategy that basically resonates together with your audience , you initially got to understand how the Instagram algorithm works -- something we’ll be discussing next.Unfortunately, it also had some undesirable effects.

Whereas a chronological feed requires little-to-no guesswork (all you actually need to worry about is posting when your audience is most active), algorithm-based feeds are often influenced by plenty of various factors -- like what proportion engagement a post gets or how long people spend viewing your posts.And since Instagram is consistently updating the algorithm to enhance user-experience and prioritize certain sorts of content, it are often difficult to understand the way to optimize your posts to urge the foremost engagement and reach possible…

But it’s not impossible!

Last year, Instagram actually went on record about how the Instagram algorithm works, including the factors that determine how your post will perform within the Instagram algorithm (and what percentage people will see it!). Here they're below, ranked in terms of importance:

#1: Interest

This is Instagram predicting what proportion you’ll care a few post.

The more they think you’ll “like” that post, the upper it appears in your feed. this is often supported “past behavior on similar content and potentially machine vision analyzing the particular content of the post,” consistent with Instagram.

Think about this one just like the Instagram Explore page: once you wish one video of slime, your entire explore page is filled with slime videos. And if someone in your feed posts a video of slime, Instagram’s getting to guess that you’ll like that too.