5 Tips for Selling Products on Instagram

03/07/2020 | Share:

These days, it’s not enough to wait for people to visit your website through traditional means such as a search engine. To step up your game, you need to take advantage of Instagram as a method of promoting and selling your products. What’s great about Instagram is that it has a dedicated explore section specifically for shopping. And since the Instagram Explore algorithm is optimised to show people posts tailored to their individual interests, you’re more likely to reach your target audience here, provided you follow these 5 tips…

Use the right hashtags

If you’re new to hashtags, they work a bit like keywords. It adds a tag to your post, allowing it to become discoverable by people who follow that hashtag or those who have liked posts with that hashtag or closely-related hashtags. They’re also searchable within the Instagram search feature.

You need to make sure that you tag your posts with appropriate and relevant hashtags that fit with the theme of your post. Try to go for a wide range of hashtags, rather than focusing on the same topic. For example, if you’re selling flowers, you could use the hashtags #flowers, #flowersofinstagram and #giftideas . Each hashtag is closely related but by adding #giftideas you open up your exposure to more than just flower fanatics.

Make sure you include contextual hashtags too, such as #ValentinesDay, #MothersDay #FridayFeeling to capitalise on concepts indirectly related to your business. By spending a bit of time on Instagram yourself, you’ll soon get a feel for these.

Another thing to do is perform hashtag research. Look at the typical hashtags you’d use and begin to type them into the search bar on Instagram. You’ll see other suggestions for you to use too. When selecting a popular hashtag, you’ll also see a list of related hashtags at the top of the grid. Try to include these too. Ideally, you want a mixture of high volume/high competition hashtags, low volume/low competition hashtags and some from the middle ground.

Use high-quality visuals

People are less likely to buy from you if your photos look like they’ve been taken in your bedroom. Using high-quality images of your products is always going to sell them better and should be a priority.

If you’ve already set up an e-commerce site, you’ll likely have some product shots against a plain background and these can come in handy for some organic posts and for advertising. Make sure you also take photos of your products in use by other people, if possible. There are apps you can use to improve your imagery if you need to.

If you’re struggling for content, you can regularly take breaks from photography by sharing typography posts that you’ve made with applications such as Canva.

Work With Industry Influencers

The best way to sell products on Instagram is to work with influencers who play a role in your industry. For example, if you’re selling fashion products, you don’t necessarily want to collaborate with an influencer from the technology industry – unless there’s some sort of fun twist!

These influencers will have a large following of people who are interested in what they specialise in. They’ll showcase your product to them and it acts as a virtual word of mouth: if someone so passionate about fashion is wearing your jeans, then perhaps your website is worth a visit.

Optimise Your Instagram for Sales

For people to go from your Instagram page to your website and place an order, you need to make things as easy as possible. Start by ensuring that you include a link to your site within your Instagram bio, including any important information such as sales, discount codes and customer service hours.

In order for your posts to appear on the shopping feed, you need to tag them as products. For this to happen, you need to set up a Facebook Catalogue and then link it to Instagram. People clicking on your tagged products will be taken to the product page to make their purchase.

Setting up a Facebook Pixel, will allow you to track purchases and website visits, giving you data to work with and opening up more targeting options for ad targeting.

Create Targeted Carousel Ads

With a Facebook Catalogue and Pixel now in place, you’re able to use them to help your advertising efforts. The catalogue is able to link up with your Facebook Ads, so that you can remarket to the people who visited your website. Carousel ads provide up to 10 product images and dynamically adapt to show the correct product description and price, taken from the catalogue.