Is your brand Insta-worthy?

“What’s your Instagram account?” is probably one of the most frequently asked questions by everyone, everywhere. While Instagram used to be known as a mere trendy “millennial” hangout platform, it has evolved into an incredible social networking and advertising tool for businesses to utilise. In fact, it is the fastest growing social media site worldwide with over 500 million active users, 300 million of which use it at least once a day.

We all know that Instagram offers visual content, but what exactly makes it so successful, engaging, and popular? Here are some compelling reasons why your business should hop onto the Insta-bandwagon:

1) A picture tells a thousand words

Sure, you can always slap on a paragraph of text for your readers to digest, but having your consumers recognise your brand personality through jaw-dropping images effectively takes engagement to a whole new level. Coca-Cola sure knows a thing or two about Instagram – they successfully demonstrate the fun, unique, and vibrant brand through great imagery.

Instagram-cocacola

Source: @cocacola on Intagram

2) We live in a mobile world

Every business is looking for creative ways to produce thumb-stopping content. Luckily, Instagram is one of the very few apps where the interface itself is designed to be optimised on mobile. As such, visual content is the main focus simply because it’s easy to digest. Swiping through Instagram has never been easier and successful businesses can capitalise on this opportunity to directly reach key audiences.

3) In-app opportunities are endless

Instagram provides a whole range of activities which allow you to not only reach out to your audience, but also let them interact directly with you. For instance, one of the most effective Instagram uses is to host giveaways or contests. Lancome launched the #bareselfie campaign to promote its DreamTone serum and the results were miraculous – generating more than 500 fan Instagram photos, 50% of the serum’s sales, and a 4% conversion rate on Lancome’s site. Initiatives such as contests help to increase visibility, and gives your audience a chance to react to and participate in your campaigns.

Instagram-Lancome-competition

Source: @lancomeusa on Instagram

4) Ads are beautiful too

Let’s face it, everything on Instagram is breath-taking, even sponsored ads. Instagram utilises native advertising strategically, where ads are curated to blend in together with the platform’s original posts. People usually avoid ads the second they see one, but on Instagram you probably won’t mind taking a short glance. Ads, such are the examples below, are also paired with an effective call-to-action, helping to further drive engagement and increase website site traffic.

                                                      Instagram 4        Instagram 2

Sources: @magnum and @beautifullovewedding on Instagram

It’s time to strip away the stereotype that Instagram is only for attention-seeking teenage users.

This increasingly popular platform can do amazing things for your brand’s presence, visibility, and overall performance. If your brand is not already on Instagram, it’s time to jump onboard.

Follow our Instagram page @mutantcomms and drop us a note at hello@mutant.com.sg to see how we can help build your social media presence through great content.

 

5 simple rules for using #hashtags

Before 2007, no one would’ve imagined that the hash symbol, most commonly used to denote numbers, would become such an incredible part of social media.

Put simply, hashtags are used to categorise content and make your own content discoverable amidst an overwhelming load of information. They allow brands to reach out to a very specific target audience who are interested in your content and would like to be a part of your network.

The hashtag is one of the most effective search functions on a multitude of social media platforms – but only when used correctly. Here’s our tips to make the most of your hashtags:

Different platforms, different purposes

Most social media platforms utilise hashtags to organise data and provide a more seamless social media experience. However, each network has its own unique way of optimising them. For example, ‘trending topics’ on Twitter are based on the number of times a particular hashtag is used and on Instagram, hashtags take you to pictures of the same subject.

Be clear with what works for each platform, otherwise your efforts will be pointless.

Go unbranded

Trust me, you don’t need to hashtag your own brand to be noticed. Keep up with the latest trends by monitoring what your target audience are saying – events and occasions such as #Ramadan, #NationalFriendshipDay or #SharingisCaring. But remember, stay relevant. Don’t hashtag something that happened last week. Social media trends change at lightning speed, and so should you.

Here’s a great example from Dominos:

Dominos Post with useful hashtags

 

What goes better with football than pizza with your mates? Dominos leveraged on #CopaAmerica16 to offer its audience a special discount.

Here’s one from Sephora:

Sephora Twitter hashtag

Although they may not be directly selling anything in this post, cosmetic giant Sephora received a lot of attention with the hashtag #NationalBestFriendsDay.

 

Hashtags < words

The rule here is to never have more hashtags than words. Too many hashtags make it difficult for users (and yourself) to understand. Don’t spam, you look desperate for likes.

In the case of not being able to insert hashtags into your sentences, you can always add them in at the end of your caption. This post from Fresh is a great example of how to use hashtags effectively in an Instagram caption:

A great example for using Hashtags in an Instagram post

The key is to choose hashtags that are relevant to your brand.

Simplify, and simplify again

Don’t hashtag #every #single #word #in #your #caption. Be selective and choose hashtags that best describe your content. If you can weave them into your caption without it looking like spam, do it to minimise the number of characters (in the case of Twitter).

National Geographic gets it right in their captions on Instagram. They simplify the hashtags to focus on the main subjects of the picture.

Content marketing and social media example on Instagram

Follow the discussion

Your hashtags should be #searchable. You don’t want your post to be buried under another 350,986 posts with the same hashtag. Instead, create hashtags that have a purpose. You want to be able to click on them and scroll through what your consumers are saying about your brand, engage your audience and strike up meaningful conversation.

Reply to tweets, whether they’re good or bad, like your followers’ pictures on Instagram and comment on their Facebook posts, especially when they are relating to your brand. These small actions can create brand loyalty and increase your customers’ lifetime value.

Hashtags are one of the best ways to understand your audience on a more personal level. You’re missing out on a whole lot if you’re not already capitalising on them in your social posts!

Do you need some help getting your social media into shape? Get in touch with our team of experts at hello@mutant.com.sg.

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3 easy steps to speaking fluent Instagram

The subtle difference between a double tap and a scroll-through could lie in the caption. Instagram is full of well-lit, pretty images, but it’s the caption that anchors the image to your audience’s life

Using the right voice

The voice is the personality behind the account. The trick to achieving the right pitch is by establishing who your target audience is and mixing that with the nature of your business. You need to establish your own voice and Instagram is a social platform, so be social!

Consistency in format (both photos and choice of language)

Look at big companies like @generalelectric, you’d notice that there is a strong consistency in how the photos are all professionally shot. More importantly, there is consistency in how the captions are crafted. In the case of GE, their Instagram is all about inspiring people and sharing their research work to the world.

Ask the right questions

Look at @Sharpie’s instagram. There is a lot of art, which is great because it shows what the product can do – but the captions are conversational and show a personality behind both the brand and the images.
Here’s an example:

The picture is not great, and well that filter should be reserved for a Lana Del Ray music video, but the caption opens up the creativity of the reader and it follows the most important branding lesson we learned this year: advertising is about your audience not you.

Using the right lingo and hashtags

No matter who your audience is, Instagram is about getting people talking. There is a ton of Instagram lingo out there, and we don’t know where it comes from (either Reddit or the Kardashians) but it goes viral quickly, with short life cycles. Here are a couple we came across just looking today:

  • #transformationtuesday: self-explanatory. Used for weightloss but you could get creative with it for companies if you have a new product update.
  • #smh: shake my head
  • #fam: your peoples, someone you would consider family member
  • #wyd?: what would you do? Hypotheticals used to create conversation
  • #squadgoals: aspirations with your crew
  • #af: as heck

By now you should be speaking Instagram perfectly. If you’re a business that needs help speaking this foreign language get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg.

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10 steps to Instagram success for unsexy companies

Can you tell your brand story in nine images? According to eMarketer, Instagram’s global mobile ad revenues are expected to reach $2.81 billion by next year. With 400 million users and growing, visual content via social media is becoming an increasingly important part of a marketing campaign.

Corporate tech giants like IBM, Intel, Salesforce and Cisco are killing it on the photo-sharing app. How? The key isn’t in exotic landscapes, squat workouts, or well-lit bacon burgers – it’s about telling your brand story in a cohesive tone that’s unique to your company.

Here are 10 steps to success on one of the world’s most influential platforms.

1. Start with your core company values.

If you don’t have a tangible product to work around, the sky is still the limit for creativity. Pluck out key points from your brand manifesto. Concepts like ‘delighting customers’, ‘teamwork’, ‘encouraging innovation’ are possible to illustrate in a creative photograph.

2. Profile staff.

If the global success of Humans of New York doesn’t have you convinced, check out some of the creative staff posts from IBM. Your employees are all part of the brand story. Include a short description or anecdote of your staff member’s role in the company. Plus, there are tons of fun ways to take a profile shot for Instagram.


3. Be cohesive.

Have one picture lead to the next. We don’t just mean with colour and lighting, but with the tone of each picture. Have transitions between uploads. For example, if you’re posting about a company outing, have some transitions or pre-event hype: i.e. “T-minus 45 minutes ‘til we pile into the car for the conference!”

4. Show behind the scenes.

Context is a great way to express your brand values. Showing the magic behind what you do with a sneak peak at of your office, lab, or even toilet.

5. Engage with your community.

Instagram didn’t get to 400 million users by just being a photo app. Comments, captions and trending hashtags are chances to engage directly to your audience like a friend. It’s not the place to sell. Use the space below the snap to ask questions and likewise go through other accounts of similar companies. Then tag, comment, hashtag, and of course, double tap.

6. Humble brag about your office space.

Get inspired by accounts like @apartmenttherapy and post pics from the office. Ask users for suggestions on how to improve a space or what colour to paint a wall. Ugly office? Creative #desk spaces get good hits!

7. Show your company culture.

What do your programmers do when they’re not doing sprints? Create FOMO with your staff. Show happy staff in action, whether brainstorming, in a meeting, or just chillin’ on the couch. A strong company culture strengthens a company’s brand. Likewise, your staff are your brand ambassadors, and happy staff are more likely to share their company activity on social media leading to more engagement.


8. Hop on holidays.

Festive holidays and other relevant events are an easy way to be part of a larger dialogue and increases your chance of being noticed. Even posting a custom greeting card, Christmas tree, or candy hearts spelling out your company name connects you to your users.

9. Focus on quality.

Take an extra couple of seconds to step into the right light and do a little set planning before snapping and uploading. Amateur pics are great to ‘keep it real’, but at the end of the day, you’re competing with millions of photos online. Make each one count.

10. Own it.

Popularised by Millennials inspired to ‘work with what they got’, owning it is taking pride in what you have. Businesses today don’t need to look longingly at National Geographic  or Nasty Gal with envy. Say, if you have cloud-based software that’s hard for people to understand, create fun ways to illustrate it. There are plenty of pretty accounts out there, just make yours looks like you (don’t believe me? Just take a look at Sharpie’s account. It’s only a pen, but it’s one of the coolest Instagram pages around.)

Do more (of what makes you happy) #BeHappy #Sharpie   A photo posted by @sharpie on

We hope this helps your company get its Instagram game off the ground. Tweet us @mutantcomms to tell us how you make your unsexy business cool, or get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg

How to make your Instagram content discoverable

Congratulations! You’ve created an Instagram page for your business. Now what?

Since acquiring Instagram in 2012, Facebook has kept this simple photo-sharing app going from strength to strength.

With developers tirelessly rolling out updates to enhance its existing features, marketers and business owners alike need to ensure they are keeping up with the changes and learning to use the functionalities to their advantage.

Earlier this year, Instagram shifted its focus to its search function, giving users an even more comprehensive experience. This function was later made available on Instagram’s website, making the Instagram’s explore function one of its strongest suits at the moment – excellent news for users seeking out new content!

I’d like to present you with 3 simple, yet frequently overlooked, habits I promise will amplify your content’s visibility on Instagram.

They require little effort and time, and – best of all – there’s no cost attached to help make your content more discoverable (unless, of course, you’re wanting to explore Instagram’s latest developments – advertising – which is taking off around the globe!)

  1. Geotag your content

Geotag: To Include the specific location of your photograph at the moment you upload it.

Essentially, geotagging stores your current location – longitude and latitude – along with your photo, and this data is accessible to Instagram with your permission. You can also choose to add a location to your photo through the “Name this location” option, meaning you can tell people where you are at any time – a restaurant, a shop, an event or a business headquarters.

It’s simple and effective, but most businesses don’t make proper use of this very simple function.

Having your business as a location option allows people who come by your business, whatever it may be, to choose it as a location. This means customers can ‘check in’ at your location, and it allows other used to follow the location link and see other people’s posts related to the same location. This is an incredible effective way to showcase your product or venue and reach new customers. If you’re a shop on a busy street, it can be a great way for tourists to find out about you, for example.

It also gives you the option of regramming (re-posting) the images your customers are sharing to your official business Instagram, if it aligns with your branding and tone. This opens up lines of communication between your business and customers, which is always a positive.

  1. Using hashtags

Another way to enhance discovery on Instagram is to keep up with the #hashtag game.

Please note that I am not encouraging you #to #hashtag #every #little #thing – too many people do this, and it’s a strong indication that they don’t understand the actual usage of hashtags. Too many hashtags will distract your content from its key message and gain invaluable traction.

A good rule of thumb is to stick to one hashtag unique for your business (such as your brand name), along with two to five other hashtags made up of keywords relevant to your content. Not hashtags that will get you as many “likes” on your post as possible. (i.e very generic terms that can be linked to something else entirely.)

Pairing good content with inappropriate hashtags is like putting a snake and a mongoose together – it’s painful to watch, and the mongoose has no chance.

Over time, relevant and appropriate hashtags can create a following of their own, allowing users to search for it and find out more about your business. The more specific you can get with your hashtag, the more targeted your audience will can, which ultimately leads to better engagement.

  1. Following your followers (and non-followers)

If you’re unsure of who to start following, try making use of Instagram’s search function to carry out either a location-based search, or a hashtag search. The search will lead you to images that will help you locate people who have interests similar to yours.

Look through a list of people with interests aligned with your brand’s, or people whose demographics are closest to that of your intended audience. (Their bios and posts would be a good indication of their personalities, to a certain extent.)

If you already have a following, you may want to consider following your followers back. Alternatively, you can go through your competitor’s followers, and identify those you would like to follow.

Following people is almost like an open invitation into their lives, allowing you to find out more about what people are talking about and what they care about. You will also be able to identify social media trends taking place and better craft content around that trend to stay relevant!

If you’d like to speak about your brand’s social media strategy, please feel free to reach out at hello@mutant.com.sg.      

Image: Courtesy of @sharpie‘s Instagram page