5 Instagram Features to Help Grow Your Small Business
Instagram is a powerful platform that is constantly evolving and introducing new features to grow your business. The power of Instagram really lies in its ability to connect you to your customers and act as a platform to share content that sparks conversation. No matter what industry you are in, there are Instagram features suited to help your small business connect and grow. Here are a collection of our current favourites!
Feature #1: Reels!
Instagram’s newest feature, Reels, is taking over! If you have noticed a dip in reach and engagement with your regular Instagram posts, it could be because Instagram is now primarily promoting reels throughout the platform’s explore page. Reels allow you to share 15 or 30 second videos about your business or industry. These capitalize on users short attention spans and allow you to share fun content in a fast paced way!
Looking for an idea for your first reel? We chose to introduce our team, take a look!
Feature #2: Instagram Live
Nervous about going Live on Instagram? Trust us, we understand. It can be hard to put yourself in the spotlight when staying behind the scenes comes so naturally to so many of us. Having said that, Instagram Live can be so impactful when it comes to growing your relationships! There are so many fun things to do on Live whether it’s a collaboration conversation with another account, a Q&A with your audience, or a behind the scenes look at a launch or product you are creating.
Need some extra encouragement to get going? We began doing Instagram Lives in August as a way to answer questions about social media and chat with our audience. Not only has this been an amazing way to connect with our community, but we had new individuals join SMC Club from our Lives right away!
Feature #3: Engagement Stickers in Stories
Let’s talk about Instagram Stories Stickers! Instagram Stories have been around for a while now, and one of the features within stories you should definitely be using are engagement stickers! These include stickers like the poll, the questions, the quiz, and anything else that encourages followers to engage!
This is a great way for you to ask your following questions and get insightful answers in real time. Not only does this help improve your engagement for the Instagram algorithm, but this allows you to create mini focus groups in your stories and make meaningful decisions in your business to help you grow!
Feature #4: IGTV
For longer form videos, IGTV is your bestfriend! This is the perfect place to share videos that are too long for stories or reels. You are still able to have a preview of the video show up on your main feed, but there is also an additional IGTV tab for users to browse all of your IGTVs in one place.
Bonus tip: Have you done an Instagram live that you don’t want to disappear? You can save Instagram lives after the fact to your IGTV, giving them a permanent home and a way for individuals to watch after they’ve happened!
Feature #5: Instagram Shopping
If your business is selling products, Instagram’s shopping features will be crucial for you! Instagram is constantly updating the e-commerce features within the app, and there are now countless ways to link your products and help followers shop!
Instagram is rolling out a new user interface that includes a shopping directory where users can browse different shops & items based on their interests. Businesses can also tag products in their posts and stories to encourage shopping, and further, business accounts can have an instagram shop visible on their profile to show available products. This takes the guess work out of your audience needing to leave the app to try and find the product they are looking for on your website.
Our friends at Flytographer do a great job of this!
While this is a collection of our current favourite features for small businesses, it is important to remember Instagram is constantly evolving and the algorithm favours accounts that are trying out new features! Right now that means Reels, but tomorrow it could mean something new! Stay ahead of your competition by adopting multiple features on Instagram to share your story in different ways.