A business Instagram account gives you more insights, more features and more advertising opportunities. Want to see how many times your profile has been viewed? Do you want to be able to place ads in the Stories? Do you also want a contact button in your Instagram profile? In this article, we'll explain further how to turn your personal profile into a business Instagram account.
What is a business Instagram account?
We receive the question "what is a business Instagram account?" more and more often. Instagram has been incredibly popular for years. Because Instagram's popularity has increased so tremendously over the years, the social media platform became increasingly interesting for businesses as well. Until October 2016, there was no way for businesses to create a business Instagram account (also called Instagram Business). As an organization, you simply had to create a regular Instagram account and then profile yourself as a business.
Instagram Business allows businesses to create an Instagram business account with a number of useful features, including statistics. Instagram Business is still best compared to a business Facebook page for your company.
That still leaves the question of how to then create a business Instagram account. We're going to explain that in the next steps below.
Step 1: Create an Instagram account
Currently, there is no option to create a corporate account directly. You must first create a personal account and then switch to a business profile. Check out the steps below to learn how to create an Instagram business profile. So step one is: create an Instagram account. Do you already have an Instagram account? Then proceed to step 2.
Step 2: Edit account
Go to your profile and navigate to the "Edit" button under your profile picture. Tap the option to switch to a professional account.
Step 3: keep going, keep going, keep going
Click "Continue" often enough until you can choose a category. Once you have chosen an appropriate category, you can decide whether you want to display it on your profile.
Step 4: Select Company
On the next page, select "Company" and click "Next." Check your contact information. Be sure to include your official business email and contact information. If you have a physical location, including an address is a good way to add credibility to your profile. If you want to enable a "Call" button, you can enter a phone number
Tap "Next" and you're done. You have now created a business Instagram account to promote your business.
Optimize your Instagram business profile
Creating a business Instagram account is just the first step. If you are serious about using Instagram for your business, your profile should reflect this. Optimize your profile with the following elements:
- Profile photo: Use your company logo so people can easily recognize your brand.
- Name: Use your company's name, consistent with your other social profiles.
- Username: This should also be your company name. Make sure your username does not contain spaces.
- First-name words: This option is available for any profile, but use it only if you are the face of your company.
- Links: You can add up to five clickable URLs here. Most companies link to their website or latest promotional pages. If necessary, use a "link in bio" tool to link more than five pages.
- Bio: Use your Instagram bio to grab the attention of other users. Describe what your business does, promote your website or post your brand's slogan (or a combination).
- Category: Select the category that best describes your industry or products/services.
- Contact options: Add all the best ways customers can contact you, such as email, phone or physical address.
- Action buttons: Add a call-to-action button to your Instagram profile, such as "Order food," "Book now" or "Reserve."
- Instagram Story Highlights: Create Story Highlights so people can easily find relevant information. Categorize your Highlights based on the types of Stories your brand typically creates.
- Page: Link your Instagram business profile to your Facebook business page.
n link business Instagram page and business Facebook page
Now we come to the most fun and exciting part of this article: linking Instagram with your business Facebook page. Don't have a business Facebook business page yet? Then read how to create a business Facebook business page here . Want to know how to link a business Instagram account with your business Facebook business page? You do this as follows:
- Within the Instagram app, go to the account you want to link.
- Go to your profile and tap the "Edit" button under your profile picture.
- Select "Page" under "Public Company Information."
- Click "Link an existing page."
- Select the page you want to link to.
- Click "Done" after selecting a page.
Now everything is ready to get started. Would you also like to understand a little better what benefits it offers. Below are the four benefits of a business Instagram account.
Four benefits of a business Instagram account
Benefit 1: Statistics
I personally think this is the most important benefit. Namely, you can see the statistics of your Instagram account. Think about the percentage of male/female, number of profile visits, number of interactions, number of views and number of website clicks. This data is an important part of evaluating how your Instagram posts are performing and combination to why. At what time of day is the best time to post, but more importantly when not to post. Similarly, you can combine that by posting certain posts for women at a different day and time than a post that focuses more on men.
Benefit 2: Additional marketing functionalities within Instagram
Having a business Instagram account also has the advantage of giving you more marketing/advertising opportunities within the platform. In fact, once the link between Facebook and Instagram is established, you can start promoting posts and other content.
This can be done both with photos and videos in the timeline, as well as through paid Stories. Attract attention with a single image or show all your products in a convenient carousel or collection.
You are able to make certain choices there, select the audience to be reached very specifically. Select interest, behavior, by location or other demographics and you spend your advertising budget on only truly relevant audiences.
Benefit 3: Contact opportunities
Because business information is easy to find on Instagram, someone can immediately call, email or request directions when they visit the Instagram page.
This is incredibly useful for promoting products or offering a local service. Then interested parties can immediately request the information they need.
Benefit 4: You have access to tagging products in posts and Stories
You can also "tag" your products in posts and Stories. One of the requirements to be admitted to the 'Shopping on Instagram' functionality is that you have an approved business Instagram account. But what is that Shopping on Instagram?
For example, when you sell t-shirts and you post a picture of the t-shirt on Instagram, you can tag the product, so to speak. The moment someone then clicks on the product, he can immediately go to the right page on the website and buy the product. So this can lead to direct sales through Instagram!
If you have any other questions about using Instagram. Please be sure to contact us.
