Instagram Guides. What are they and how do I use them to promote my business?

Instagram guides are a great way to share helpful recommendations and tips in an easy to digest format.

Guides allow us to follow a feed of posts with commentary, which is perfect as a step-by-step guide for tips, recommendations, and products.

How to create an Instagram guide.

Tap the plus icon on the top-right of your profile page and select “Guide.”

From this point, you can choose three different guide formats.

Places: For example, recommend places in your city.

Products: Recommend new products that have just landed

Posts: Recommend posts you have created in the past

Each formatting option is designed to be tailored to your business's needs.

For example, guides can be used to curate a thread of products with custom headlines and commentary.

Only products that are featured in your Instagram store can only be used to curate product guides.

Places are perfect for city guides.

See @thesocialdeli's guide to restaurants and cafes in Melbourne!

How to access Instagram guides.

To access an Instagram guide, visit a creator’s profile page, and select the new guides icon from the feed tab.

From here you will be able to see all of the Guides a creator has shared:

You can easily share your latest Instagram guide in a story by tapping on the paper plane icon at the top right-hand corner of the screen.

Instagram guides create a whole new world of curated and easy-to-digest content, opening up more and more opportunities to tell your business's story and create connections with new and potential customers.

How to optimise your Instagram bio.

Crafting an effective Instagram bio optimised for small business marketing can be a challenge, to say the least. Summarising your business, what it stands for, and how to purchase your products and services in under 150 characters is no small feat. But don’t stress, we've broken down the elements that make up a successful and effective Instagram bio to get you on track for social media growth and future sales!

So first things first, why does your Instagram bio even matter?

Your Instagram bio plays a crucial role in your customer journey as in many cases, this will be the first thing they see when clicking on your profile from a sponsored post, hashtag, or the explore page.

Those 150 characters will be the first thing they will look for when trying to work out what you do and how they can purchase your product or service.

Let's say you own a bakery and your feed is filled with delicious looking baked goods. You’ve managed to capture the perfect melt-in-your-mouth Instagram posts but you've forgotten to put the location of your store in your Instagram bio.

The user isn’t going to bother DM’ing you to ask where you're located, instead, they're most likely to click back onto the explore page and continue on their day, doughnut free and yearning for a baked treat. Here you are completely unaware that you’ve missed out on a new potential customer.

Okay okay, so we now know your Instagram bio is important. How do we get started?

1. Name and username

Your name and username is your brand’s identity and a way for people to find your profile. In a lot of cases, you will want your name and username to be the same as your brand name. In some instances when your brand name is long, stick with a commonly used abbreviation for your brand name in your Instagram username and use the longer version in your Instagram name in your bio.

For example, St Ali Coffee Roasters has @st_ali for their username and St. Ali Coffee Roasters in their name in their bio. This means when someone stumbles across the store and wants to tag their café in their Insta #coffee shot, they can easily find @st_ali when searching for this in the search bar.

2. Profile Photo

Just like your name and username is your brand's ‘identity’, your profile photo is the visual accompaniment. This photo should be the brand identity or logo you typically display throughout your business's communications. If you don’t have a logo or package shot to use here, this should be a visually pleasing image that tells a story about your business and what you are trying to sell.

See the @thegrounds - they have placed their logo in their profile photo and it looks clean and very recognizable. Users will click through from their profile and land on The Grounds' landing page and won't think they've taken a wrong turn. Everything in their branding from their website through to their social media is consistent and recognizable.

3. Website

This is your conversion tool where all your hard work comes to fruition. This is also the only place on the platform where you can actually have a click-able link so be sure not to waste the opportunity.

When in doubt, simply paste a link to your website. However, it is a much better idea to use a tracking service like linktree or link in bio. These apps allow you to have a direct link from the post to a page on your site, meaning users don’t need to dig around your website to find what they are looking for and instead are taken directly to the featured content or product.

4. Category

Don’t forget to click on a category. This part can help to define what your products and services are and as it is placed directly under your business name, it frees up space within your bio to write more about other aspects of your business.

5. Call to action buttons

You can also free up more space in your bio by creating clickable call to action buttons. These buttons allow users to take a particular action directly from the mobile app.

6. Contact Information

Make the most of the email and call buttons, again allowing you to free up space in your bio to talk more about your business and what it is all about.

7. Instagram bio

Okay, this is the crucial bit here. The 150 characters really need to define what you do, what you’re trying to sell, and why users should love your business over your competitors.

We've split the bio into three lines to give you a clear guide on how to make this the most effective for your business.

First line:

Who are you and what are you selling?

Second Line:

Where are you located?

Third line:

How can people buy your products or services?

A great example is @lucyliumelbourne’s Instagram bio as it clearly defines who they are, what they are selling, AND it also tells users where they can book a table.

Another great example is @aesopskincare. As they are located in many stores throughout Australia they have used their extra characters 'otherwise used for location' to explain what they are selling, what they stand for, and why you should buy them.

The three highlighted core values “founded in 1987”, “vegan”, and “cruelty-free” are important aspects of the business that people might instinctually connect to and want to buy.

To wrap it all up...

An effective Instagram bio can not only help to propel your social media audience but can convert followers to potential customers. It's simple to do and may just free up some time you might spend otherwise answering various DM messages for more business info.

If you think you might like an expert to optimise your Instagram bio, please get in touch at hello@thesocialdeli.co

We also have plenty of social media services and as we can work virtually as well as in-person we can reach you throughout various locations around Australia including Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Perth, and Canberra.

5 ways to effectively communicate with your social media audience during coronavirus.

The coronavirus outbreak has put almost every country in the world under significant pressure and affected all of us in one way or another. Small businesses are faced with some very tough decisions in the wake of this global crisis, forcing quick adaptations and, of course, the age-old business ‘pivot’.

However, no matter how you view this situation, we have all seen social media experience a massive shift in content.

Since the growth of Instagram and the introduction of social media influencers, we have been accustomed to perfectly curated and highly upbeat social media posts. We have been conditioned and have come to expect this form of perfection and refinement from our favourite brands.

As we are all adjusting to this new normal, with many of us being locked down or quarantined, social media has seen some major changes with brands presenting a refreshing and much-needed humanised approach.

With the change in reality and sudden emergence of normalcy, engagement is skyrocketing for brands and influencers who are shifting their communications accordingly.

So how can your brand effectively communicate and not only maintain, but grow your engagement?

QUALITY OVER QUANTITY

Small businesses are in major struggle street in Australia and sometimes the last thing they have on their mind is marketing.

From what we are hearing from a lot of small businesses, they have had to let some, if not all, of their team go (including their dearly departed marketing gurus), they do not have enough hours in the day, they are constantly pivoting their business model, and they can’t even imagine making a plan when no one knows when the restrictions will be fully lifted.

I hear you! This is crazy! How can we keep up this pretense of a successful brand when we don’t have the resourses or the time?

PARE IT BACK

Yes, that’s right. A social media marketing agency is telling you to pare back your socials. Now that doesn’t mean delete your scheduled posts if you are one of the few highly organised and digitally enthusiastic business owners. I’m just saying, DO WHAT YOU CAN! If you can only post two or three times a week, so be it!

But PLEASE, make those posts worthwhile!

If your post isn’t shocking, informing, uplifting, or making people salivate or laugh, what’s the point? Busy work is not necessary at this time - delivering value to your followers is key.

HUMANISE

Almost everyone I have spoken to is struggling right now and through the isolation and inevitable loneliness that lockdown creates, we are all desperately trying to connect.

So how do we really connect with a bored and lonely audience?

The best strategies we have seen so far are brands that are focusing on thoughtful content and messaging, empathising with their audience and really focusing on how to positively increase engagement. Creating posts that resonate with your followers will help to cut through the noise, bringing awareness to your brand.

MICRO-BLOGGING

Taking a more personal approach to communications during this time is also key. We have seen many brands adopting the “micro-blog’ caption strategy, employing the idea of telling a story with each social post. This means that your captions are a lot longer in length and explain what is going on with your brand in a heartfelt way.

The idea is to try to be positive and upbeat when you can but don’t miss out on the moments when you, as a brand or a business owner, can really connect by sharing your personal story, daily struggles and perhaps even a bit of laughter.

Videos are also a great way to communicate with your audience and they are each day becoming easier to create. If you are not currently on the TikTok bandwagon we highly suggest you give it a go as this is a great platform to reach out to a whole new audience. *Tiktok blog coming VERY soon!

BE SENSITIVE

Before you create a social media post, think about how this will sit in someone’s feed. This may sit beside a post that is incredibly heartfelt including someone who is facing severe hardship or the loss of a loved one.

How does it look?

Avoid anything too tongue-in-cheek during this time and understand that although we all want a laugh, this can come at the expense of your brand's reputation. So be sensitive to everyone’s current situation and try to think about how your post may affect them.

GIVE BACK

Okay, this isn't an optimization hack but It is something we see in any successful business. Giving back to your local community might seem like the last thing you can do right now but there are people that could really use your help. If you think you have it bad, someone probably has it worse and it’s so important to help those in need when and if you can.

In saying this, Social Deli is currently giving away free social media packs and social media mentoring during this time to small businesses that are struggling financially and want to market their new products or services (find more on our packs here).

WRAPPING IT UP

Although the above strategies are not a one-size-fits-all method, pursuing some of them within your brand communications may help to not only cement your existing following but increase engagement during a very tough period. The best we can do right now is try to connect, market our new business model, (be that takeaway food or zoom Pilates sessions) and stay top of mind.

If we increase brand awareness and loyalty now, this can only lead to a positive branding experience and, hopefully, increase your sales in the future.

All the best peeps, we believe in you! Go get ‘em!

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So who the hell are we?

Social Deli is a social media marketing agency in Melbourne and we have a reach throughout Australia, currently in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, and Byron Bay.

We would love to help you to curate, photograph, and optimize your social media content! We have social media packs with weekly affordable rates starting at $150 per week.

Social Deli will be holding social media & content creation workshops for small businesses in Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane in late 2020. If you would like to be the first to know, shoot us an email and we will contact you when we lock in the dates.

If you think you might be interested in hearing more about our social packs GET IN TOUCH and we can set up a phone chat to discuss how we can help you get your socials back on track!