How Instagram is Boosting E-Commerce Sales for Small Businesses

The ongoing global pandemic has expedited the shift of commerce from offline to online, with e-commerce markets across the world experiencing immense growth over recent years. 

However, much of this growth has been captured by larger retailers with deeper pockets, while smaller businesses struggle to compete due to the capital-intensive nature of traditional sales methods.

But amidst the e-commerce boom lies another trend that smaller businesses can leverage — the use of Instagram marketing strategies to generate e-commerce sales. 

E-commerce opportunities presented by Instagram

According to Backlinko, Instagram currently has 1 billion monthly active users, with half of them scrolling the app on a daily basis. On top of access to such a large potential audience group, Hootsuite complied a few other business-related statistics on Instagram showing its usefulness as a platform to grow your small business on:

• Instagram is the #1 social media platform for people to connect with brands
• The average Instagram business account grows its followers by 0.98% each month
• The average engagement rate on an Instagram business account post is 0.54%
• 35% of Instagram users will make a purchase on the platform in 2023
• Instagram accounts for 7.51% of web traffic referrals from social media

Altogether, carefully designed and executed Instagram marketing strategies are a proven way for small businesses to grow brand awareness and sales volumes. And with social media marketing being the most cost-effective form of advertisement today, investing into growing an Instagram business account will undoubtedly improve bottom-lines for small businesses.

Leveraging Instagram to scale small e-commerce businesses

Starting a small business on Instagram is easy, with guided steps provided by Instagram itself. It is after you have registered a professional account on Instagram that things start to get tricky, in terms of how to effectively market your business and grow e-commerce sales.

If you want to experience success in your Instagram marketing efforts, there are four things you should incorporate into your small business’ Instagram marketing strategy:

1. Batching core efforts and automating for repetition

Ensure you create high-quality content for your audiences, with thorough hashtag research, eye-catching 1080x1080 pictures, and captivating captions no longer than 2,200 words inclusive of your handle. Then, preload your content by using a scheduler, and push out your prepared collateral punctually on your Instagram business account. 

2. Providing a seamless shopping experience

Followership and engagements on Instagram are great for increasing the visibility of your small business, but you must ultimately convert them into sales if you want to do well. Carefully design the user journey from your Instagram posts or profile to the final checkout screen, in a way that entails the least number of steps to make your customer’s online shopping process easier. 

If you have a wide range of products, be sure to showcase them through your posts in an appealing and organised manner — you can consider posing multiple products in a single picture, or the use of carousels in this regard. Ultimately, your posts and profile should be easy to navigate to facilitate effortless shopping. 

3. Contests, user content, and behind-the-scenes sneak peaks

One of the key strengths of using Instagram marketing strategies for your small business lies in the nature of engagement it allows you to have with your audience. The goal here is to make your followers and consumers feel special, in exchange for recommending your business as natural ambassadors. 

You can do this by running contests and giveaways, re-posting pictures and stories of satisfied customers flaunting your products, and throwing pictures with personal touches into the mix to further facilitate a human connection between your audience and yourself. 

You will also need to set aside some time to engage with your followers. Make this routine rather than reactionary and keep to a strict time-limit; this is something you must do on a daily basis, so build a system around it that works for you. 

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