7 Instagram Marketing Tips to Elevate Your B2B Strategy
Now, that you know why you need Instagram for B2B marketing, here are some tips to ensure an effective strategy:
1. Define Your Audience and Goals
A successful B2B Instagram strategy requires a solid foundation. That’s why you need to define your ideal audience and goals clearly. Both play a key role in determining your Instagram marketing strategy components, like which content types you’ll use, how you’ll phrase your messaging, the types of ads you’ll run, and so on. Understanding your ideal customer allows you to tailor your content to prospects’ needs and interests.
Here’s what to pay attention to when defining your B2B target audience:
Industry – Who are the businesses you want to reach?
Operations – What do these businesses do? (If relevant to your services or products)
Company size – Are you targeting small startups or established enterprises? Large teams or small teams? Both?
Decision makers – Who are the key people involved in the buying process? Are they CEOs, department heads, line managers, etc?
Relevance/ Pain points – How can these businesses use your products to improve their operations? What do they need your product for?
Triggers – What type of message do they typically respond to?
With these details, you should have a clear customer profile. You can gather your data through industry reports, publications, and other resources. If you’ve been in business for a while, assess your current customer base and sales leads to identify trends and interests. If promoting your pharma B2B portal, emphasize how it meets specific industry needs and resolves pain points effectively. Also, conduct a thorough competitor analysis to see whom your competitors target on social media and note user attributes you can appeal to. Use social listening tools to see how potential B2B customers engage with specific industry terms or hashtags. Additionally, consider using market surveys to gather insights from your target audience. You can use platforms like Survey Monkey or partner with research firms that cater to your industry.
To set goals, be clear about what you want to achieve with your Instagram marketing efforts. In general, it could be to:
Your goals should be specific, and have a clear time for achievement. For example, you could aim to “increase website traffic by 20% within the next 3 months.” Goals like these are easy to track and assess.
Also, remember to set goals relevant to your overall business objectives.
2. Optimize Your Profile
A well-optimized social media profile can make a positive first impression with potential clients. Optimizing your Instagram profile can also help you get discovered faster. Instagram now has a built-in search engine that can help profiles or posts with specific keywords get discovered. See the search results for the term “B2B marketing.”
Notice how brands with the keyword appear among the suggestions.
Additionally, well-optimized Instagram profiles usually pop up on search engines like Google. See the example below:
So, consider adding keywords to your profile description. Do this naturally, though. Avoid stuffing a bunch of keywords in. Blue Buzz, for instance, incorporates keywords the right way to optimize its profile:
Also, include accurate business details on your profiles. Add a clickable link to your website in your bio. You can also include your business address and phone number. This way, you not only show your professionalism but also let prospects know that you’re reachable.
3. Develop a Content Strategy
To ace your B2B Instagram marketing efforts, you need a clear roadmap — that’s what the content strategy is. The content strategy highlights how you’ll use your Instagram content to achieve set goals.
A well-defined content strategy will include the following:
Content pillars
These are core themes that direct your content creation. Think of it as the categories where your various content pieces will fall. It could be a mix of inspirational, educational, promotional, or entertaining content.
Choose 2 – 3 content pillars directly relevant to your brand’s outlook and target audience. You can also create more personalized content pillars for your business needs.
Content Format
This refers to how you present your content. For instance, will they be through Instagram stories, reels, carousels, static images, and so on? Consider exploring different content formats initially. Then, gradually transition to formats that your audience engages with the most.
Content Type
This is how you will convey the information in your chosen format. Will you have a talking video with accompanying captions or a stand-alone animated video? Will it be a static image with text or purely visuals, etc?
Flick’s AI social media tool can help you create some of these content types. You can, for instance, craft highly personal and on-brand captions for your static images and videos in seconds. All you need to do is give the tool some information about the type of content you want. Will it be long, conversational, and in the first-person point of view? Just input the products and services you wish to promote, too. Flick’s AI assistant will then help you create effective content for your Instagram marketing. Consider working with an industrial or SaaS SEO agency to discover potential keywords you can incorporate into your final Instagram content for the best visibility. Posting Frequency
This indicates how often you’ll post content. It’s advisable to find a frequency that you can maintain. Consider what your team can do and your typical content creation process. For instance, if you have a one-person team handling copywriting, design, and posting, you may have to post less frequently. But you can post more regularly if you have specific people specializing in different areas.
Also, the content types and formats will be important in determining your posting frequency. Videos may take longer to create than images, for instance, and may, therefore, allow only for less frequent posting.
Overall, keep this in mind—it’s better to post high-quality content less frequently than to bombard your audience frequently but with posts that offer no value.
When working on a content strategy, plan with a content calendar. You can use a tool like Flick to schedule your content.
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4. Maintain a Consistent Visual Style
A consistent visual style is what allows your Instagram page to stand out. Your profile doesn’t merely look like a scattered collection of posts. Instead, you have a page that showcases your brand personality and makes people visit.
A consistent visual style entails using the same blend of colors, logos, fonts, and overall design elements throughout your content. Here’s a good example on Zoho’s page:
The aim is to create content that the Instagram audience can use to identify your brand. If a follower stumbles on your post on Instagram’s Explore page, they should know that it’s you even before clicking on it.
Also, a consistent visual shows the thoughtfulness and intentionality you put into creating your content. That could also be something followers are drawn to. It can probably explain why a brand with a colorful Instagram grid attracts viewers to its page. As a final tip, ensure your visual representation is consistent with what you have on different digital fronts like your website or other social media platforms.
Hashtags are key to getting discovered on Instagram. They’re like specific search terms people can use to find content. By using relevant hashtags related to your B2B offerings, you can increase your content’s visibility and join industry trends. If your content is any good, you can easily boost Instagram likes, comments, and shares. For instance, if you search for #projectmanagement on Instagram, you’ll find a collection of posts about the topic:
You can even create your own branded hashtag to build a community around your brand. Hubspot for instance has a branded hashtag “#hubspot:”
Hashtags can also be useful for promoting special campaigns and they’re particularly helpful for maximizing user-generated content. For example, Instagram user @blacjoker made the post below using Hubspot’s hashtag:
Instead of opting for the most popular hashtags, which can be overly broad and competitive, focus on niche hashtags that directly relate to your key offerings. This strategy ensures your content can reach specific B2B customers interested in your offerings.
Also, consider using relevant hashtags in your captions. The idea is to keep your posts clean and focused while avoiding the clutter of excessive hashtags. See how Flick does it in this post caption: Over time, you can adjust your hashtags based on what’s working best for your engagement and reach. Discover relevant, top-performing hashtags by using Flick Social. Even better, Flick’s AI tool can auto-generate relevant hashtags based on your post caption. Give it a spin.
6. Engage with Your Audience
Engagement is a crucial aspect of your marketing efforts on Instagram. It’s not enough to simply churn out posts. Prioritize being relatable and genuinely connecting with your audience, just as they connect with you.
If users leave comments on your posts, make sure to respond. This demonstrates that you’re not just seeking attention but also giving attention back to your target audience, which they will likely appreciate.
Also, when followers send direct messages, respond promptly. This can go a long way in building strong relationships with prospects.
Consider using tools like Meta Business Suite to stay on top of your comment section. The business suite allows you to respond to your comments and direct messages from a single place. Here’s an example of how the interface looks:
Additionally, you can employ listening tools to find conversations around your business name and engage with the relevant ones.
Over time, you’ll need to track your progress. This is how you can assess what’s working and what isn’t. Analyzing key metrics helps you understand which content resonates with your audience and allows you to refine your strategy to focus on what delivers the best results.
It’s more effective to connect these metrics with the goals you initially set. Key metrics you can track include:
Reach – How many unique users have seen your posts.
Engagement – Includes likes, comments, shares, and saves, indicating how users interact with your content.
Website clicks – To know how many users are clicking through to your website from your Instagram profile or posts.
Impressions – The total number of times your posts have been seen. It also includes multiple views from the same users.
With analytics tools like Flick Social, you can measure your progress on Instagram accurately and make informed decisions. This way, you can adjust your content and engagement strategies for better results.