What the Instagram ads? Currently there are popular tools for paid search and display advertising including Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and even some industry-related social websites. And you can also run some guerilla advertising campaigns, or advertise via National Radio. But perhaps Instagram has been overlooked for a number of reasons, and you are not sure if it will bring profit from investment either.
So, I will tell you one thing: do not miss Instagram!
While Instagram is probably new and has fewer users than its parent company Facebook, Instagram is a notable rising star in paid advertising tools!
Instagram provides a platform to tell visual stories through different ad formats, and many advertisers have found this channel to yield a higher return on investment than their other advertising campaigns.
By the end of 2017, Instagram had 800 million active users. According to Statista, the growth rate, since 2013, is amazingly fast. You can take a look at the chart below.
But with so many users and events gliding on their walls at all hours of the day, how in the world does a small business like yours stand out?
This is the point where Instagram ads work. For Facebook, the popularity comes from mess, and systematically overtaking that clutter to make a real impact can feel almost impossible. To focus on the right people, at the right time, with the right message and image, advertising on Instagram is your powerful means of doing so.
In this tutorial, you will learn everything you need to know to get started with an Instagram advertising campaign.
What is Instagram Advertising (Instagram ads)?
Instagram advertising ( Instagram ads) is a paid way to post sponsored content on the Instagram platform, thereby reaching more targeted audiences.
While there are many reasons for a business or individual to decide to run ads, Instagram ads are often used to increase brand exposure, website traffic, and attract more potential customers and refer them to links (and hope customers buy).
Since Instagram is an intuitive platform, text ads are not a thing to pay attention to here. Instead, you need an image, gallery or video (possibly with text) to reach your audience with Instagram ads.
So, what is the interesting part here?
That Instagram ads are really effective!
In March 2017, more than 120 million Instagram users visited a website, clicked on links, called, emailed, or sent direct messages to learn about a business based on advertising on Instagram.
According to Instagram, 60% of users say they discover new products on the platform and 75% of Instagram users took action after being inspired by a post.
Similar to running ads on Facebook, you spend money on a post to increase access to your brand, as well as more control over who can see your post.
Is Instagram ads suitable for your business?
The general question of anyone who has ever intended to run instagram ads: Who is using Instagram? Are teenagers posting selfies? Or those people that are in their 20s looking for recipes? What about the elderly? Do they play Instagram like their grandchildren?
Unfortunately for marketers targeting older people like grandparents, Instagram tends to be more youthful, with the largest percentage of users falling in the 18 years old to 29 years old group (55%), then from 30 years old to 49 years old (28%). Only 11% of Instagram users are aged 50 years old to 64 years old and only 4% are adults over 65 years old.
According to Hootsuite, the majority of Instagram users live in urban areas (32%), 28% of users live in suburbs and 18% of users in rural areas. Although more women use Instagram than men, the gender gap is not as large as it used to be.
If this app does not have a lot of people that you are targeting, you still should not remove this social network as a useless thing. Similar to what happened to Facebook, more and more adults over the age of 34 will use Instagram as the platform continues to grow. In addition, if you are working with 4% of adults over 65, you can always target this target user directly.
Like many advertising platforms, Instagram gives you detailed control to target specific goals like: gender, age, location, interests, behavior, etc. You can even set a target for a custom audience group or similar audience group with the group you need to show ads to your lead list directly or show to people with the same trends.
What advertisers should really capture is that Instagram actually uses Facebook demographic data to serve ads to niche parties. This makes the tool super valuable for advertisers who want to target niche audiences, because Facebook has a long history and carefully targeted demographic targeting options.
Advertising on Instagram can be especially effective if you are in an intuitive or creative industry, such as a restaurant or handicraft business.
How much does it cost to run Instagram ads?
This is a difficult question to answer, because the cost is based on many different factors and because you may suspect these factors are not disclosed from the application. The model is based on CPC (cost per click) and CPM (cost per 1000 impressions), and the price is determined by the ad auction on Instagram.
Andrew Tate, from AdEspresso, says the cost of advertising on Instagram is influenced by many factors – everything from user’s feedback to your ads. There are many people who understand how to advertise on Instagram.
AdEspresso recently focused on $ 100 million Instagram advertising spend in 2017 and found that the average cost-per-click (CPC) for Instagram ads in the third quarter ranged from zero, 70 to 0.80 dollars. While this is a useful benchmark, of course it will vary depending on the auction level, user, competition level, time of day, day of the week, etc.
Some advertisers find that Instagram ads often have a higher level of engagement, but this can cost more. According to Keith Baumwald, the founder of Leverage Consulting, the cost of advertising on Instagram is a bit higher than advertising on Facebook. Baumwald asserts that because the ad reaches its very high goal, you can pay up to $ 5 for the cost of 1,000 impressions.
On the positive side, advertisers have control over how their budget is allocated.
For example, you can choose between a daily budget to limit the amount of money spent each day or a lifetime budget where you will set your ads to run for a period of time until your budget runs out.
Other ways to control your Instagram ad spend include:
- Set an ad schedule (for example, you can specify a certain number of hours during the day you want your ads to run)
- Set your ad delivery method (there are three options: click links, impressions and unique daily reach)
- As well as setting your bid amount (manual and automatic).
6 simple steps to start running ads on Instagram
At first, learning about a new advertising platform seemed like a lot of work. The good news is that if you advertise on Facebook, there is not much to learn. In fact, Instagram ads can be configured immediately via Facebook Ad Manager.
If you do not advertise on Facebook, do not worry. I will guide you through the process below and also create some simple ads directly in the Instagram app.
Advertisers who are more professional or running a relatively large ad group can also choose to configure their ads through Power Editor or Facebook’s Marketing API. Instagram Partners is also available for businesses that need to buy and manage multiple ads, manage a large community, and distribute content at scale.
For this post, I will focus on creating ads through Facebook Ad Manager. This is the most common method due to its ease of use and ability to customize these ads to a level higher than what is possible in the app itself. Although configuring Instagram ads is not too complicated, there are quite a few steps to keep in mind. Let’s start!
Navigate to Facebook Ads Manager
To navigate to the Ads Manager in Facebook, just follow the link, assuming you are logged into the appropriate Facebook account.
Note: There is no Ad Manager specific to Instagram; Instagram ads are managed through the Facebook ad interface.
Set marketing goals
Now continue with the fun part, choosing your campaign goal.
One thing to note is that Instagram ads only work for the following goals:
- Brand awareness
- Approach
- Traffic (to click on a website or to an app store for your app)
- Install apps
- The number of people who click anywhere on your post (Only for the number of actions directly related to the post (like, comment, share, follow, click anywhere on the post)
- Video views
- Conversion (to convert to your website or application)
Although these goals are intuitive, some need to come with a few additional steps that I will guide you through.
Brand identity: This is a long-term factor. No further steps in this section! It is the most standard target, and will try to show ads to more potential customers – who might be interested. How does Instagram determine this? It is a secret, but this goal will be able to reach a new and relevant audience for your brand.
Reach: If the reach is what you are looking for (e.g. maximizing the number of people who see your ad) then you will just need to be sure to choose Instagram when creating your ad. One thing to keep in mind is that if you are looking for ads on Instagram Story, reach is the only goal you can choose. The interesting thing about this goal is that you can take advantage of Facebook’s split testing feature, which lets you split test two ads to see which one gets more installs.
NOTE: Split testing is also available for traffic, app settings, video views, Building leads and conversion goals.
Traffic: If you are looking to send more people to your website or app store to get the app, this is the right target for you. The only additional step that you will need to take is to choose between the two options (app or web), then enter the selection URL and select the traffic item!
People click anywhere on your post: If your goal is any interaction with the post, one thing to keep in mind is that you can only pay for posts on Instagram right now. Facebook will allow you to pay for feedback on pages and events, and this is currently not available for Instagram.
Application install: If the goal is the number of app installs, you chose the right ad slot. To configure this, you will need to select your application from the app store during the setup process.
Video views: Video is often an investment of time and money, and attracting video views through running Instagram ads is a reasonable option. Fortunately, the goal is simple and does not require additional setup steps.
Build leads: If potential customers are your main goal, this section is for you. Just be aware that lead generation ads do not provide all pre-filled fields like Facebook. Instagram currently only supports email, full name, phone number and gender. These ads also have more barriers than Facebook leads, because when potential customers click to open the ad, they will need to click through to fill out their information. On Facebook, potential customers can fill in their information without clicking any more. Another setting is that you will need to create a lead form when creating your ad.
Conversion: Last, but certainly not least, is the conversion. This goal allows you to drive your potential customers to take action and convert on your website or in your app. The additional setup here requires that you configure the event on the Facebook app or pixel based on the website or app you are promoting. This will allow you to track conversions.
Determining target audience
Now that you have selected the target, you need to target the appropriate target audience for your ad to appear before the right people. This is the real advantage of Instagram advertising because you will use Facebook’s in-depth demographic knowledge to reach the right people.
If you have done this with Facebook ads before and you seem to have built a lot of audiences, you will be quite familiar with this process. If you have not done it then the procedure below will help you step by step get the correct target audience.
(For example, if you want to target women, in New York, between the ages of 19 years old and 65 years old, who are interested in yoga and health food, you can do that!)
Location: Whether you want to target a country, region, province, city, zip code, exclude or include certain locations, location targeting will allow you to do it all and even more.
Age range: Allows you to select a range of ages 13 years old to above 65 years old.
Gender: Choose between male, female, or both.
Language: Facebook recommends leaving this section blank unless your target language is uncommon for the location you target.
Demographics: In the “Detailed targets” section, you can find demographic sections, which have several subcategories with more subcategories. For example, you can select “Demographic”> “Housing”> “Home ownership”> “Tenants.”
Interests: Interests are also in the “Detailed goals” section with many subcategories to exploit. For example, if you are looking for people interested in drinks, science fiction movies or aviation, those options are available to you!
Behavior: And there is another option in the “Detailed goals” section with many subcategories to explore. Whether it is shopping behavior, job roles, anniversaries or other behaviors, the options seem endless.
Connectivity: Here, you will be able to set goals that are connected to your page, app or event.
Custom audiences: Custom audiences allow you to upload your own contact list so you direct to previously relevant leads or customers that you are looking to sell.
Similar audiences: If your custom audience has been potentially exploited, you should create similar audiences. This will allow Instagram to find people with similar characteristics to your other audiences.
After you configure your audience, Facebook will also provide you with a guide on how to specifically or expand your audience (as shown below).
This is an important tool to keep in mind, because you want to achieve a balance in your audience, make sure it is not too big (because it may not be sufficiently targeted), but not too specific (in the red area), as it may not be accessible by many people (if any) to multilayer goals.
Choose where to appear
Once you have targeted your ideal demographic, it is time to choose where to appear for the ad! This is important if your goal for a campaign is to only show ads on Instagram. If you choose to skip this step, Facebook will allow your ad to appear on both platforms.
This is not a negative thing, but if you have content that you have created specifically for Instagram, you should choose “Edit Location” as follows:
From here, you can designate Instagram as a location, as well as if you prefer these ads to appear on the platform’s wall and / or “Story” section.
Set budget and ad schedule
If you are familiar with how the budget works through Facebook, AdWords and other digital advertising platforms, this step should not be too difficult for you. If not, you should take a deep breath; although you may not know exactly where your daily or lifetime budget is when running your first Instagram ad campaign, this comes with a first test and a number of errors, and they are experience you have. And the good thing is that you have control to pause or stop your campaign at any time if you feel your budget is not properly allocated.
So, should you use daily or lifetime packages? While I usually prefer daily budgets because it ensures you will not spend too quickly over budget, a lifetime budget allows you to schedule ad serving, so there are both advantages and disadvantages to both options. I would also recommend exploring the advanced options in the image below. For example, if you bid manually, you will have control to decide how much each potential customer is worth.
As mentioned above, you can also run ad schedules to target specific times of the day and days of the week when you know when your audience is most active on the platform. This is a super valuable way to optimize your budget. As a reminder, this is only available to lifetime budget users.
Create Instagram ad
And it is time to create an ad on Instagram!
Hopefully after following the steps above, you already have some content for the ad you are trying to advertise. This setup may look different depending on your campaign goals, but you will always have a few ad format options to choose from. So, as a next step, let’s discuss the ad formats available!
Advertising format on Instagram
If you are a person who is not good at making decisions, you may want to try your best. Instagram has six ad formats to choose from. (This is a simpler way than Facebook!) Two of them are for the “Story” section on Instagram, which appears at the top of the feed in the same way as Snapchats. The remaining four formats are designed for Instagram feeds, which are more commonly used by advertisers.
#1. Advertising for images on the wall
This is your most standard ad format and probably it is the format you see most often when surfing the walls of Instagram. These ads are individual images that appear as original experiences when your potential customers are browsing their walls. The remarkable thing about these ads is that they do not feel like they are watching ads.
Here are some additional details to note:
Technical requirements:
- File type: jpg or png
- Maximum file size: 30MB
- Minimum image width: 600 pixels
- Image ratio: minimum 4: 5, maximum of 16: 9
- Text length: up to 2,200 (* although Instagram recommends staying below 90 for optimal distribution)
- Number of hashtags: up to 30 (* you can add them in comments)
The target is supported
- Approach
- Traffic
- Convert
- Number of app installs
- Create leads
- Brand awareness
- Interact with any point on the post
- List of sales products
- Store visits
Call to action buttons are supported
- Apply now
- Book now
- Call now
- Contact us
- Get directions
- Looking for more information
- Get showtimes
- Download
#2. Advertising for images on the Story
Similar to the above requirements, but applies to the Story section on Instagram! Details below:
Technical requirements
- Image ratio: 9:16 is suggested
- Minimum image width: 600 pixels
The target is supported
- Approach
- Traffic
- Convert
- Number of app installs
- Create leads
Call to action buttons are supported
- Apply now
- Book now
- Contact us
- Download
# 3. Advertising for video on the wall
Bring your ad to life with a video! If you have taken the time to create a quality video, then you should absolutely promote it through your Instagram.
While most video files are supported by Instagram, they recommend using H.264 compression, square pixels, fixed frame rates, continuous scans, and AAC stereo audio compression at 128kbps + (Small tip: if your video does not meet these requirements, you can always run it via the video transcoder, Handbrake, to make these adjustments!).
Technical requirements
- Video resolution: 1080 x 1080 pixels (at least)
- Maximum file size: 4GB
- Video aspect ratio: minimum 4: 5, maximum of 16: 9
- Video length: up to 60 seconds
- Video caption: optional
- Image ratio: minimum 4: 5, maximum of 16: 9
- Text length: maximum of 125 characters recommended
- Number of hashtags: up to 30 (* you can add them in comments)
The target is supported
- Approach
- Traffic
- Convert
- Create leads
- Brand awareness
- Interact with any point on the post
- Store visits
Call to action buttons are supported
- Apply now
- Book now
- Call now
- Download
#4. Advertising for the video on the Story
This is a great option to run video ads, because stories are where users often expect to watch videos, so the sales part of the ad will not make them feel forced. Recommended video upload parameters are listed above and here are some additional details to keep in mind!
Technical requirements
- Video resolution: 1080 x 1920 pixels (at least)
- Maximum file size: 4 GB
- Video aspect ratio: up to 9:16
- Video length: up to 15 seconds
- Video caption: not available
The target is supported
- Approach
- Traffic
- Convert
- Create leads
- Number of app downloads
Call to action buttons are supported
- Apply now
- Book now
- Call now
- Contact us
- Download
#5. Advertising in series on the wall
Next, I will show you how to advertise in series on the wall. This is an interesting thing! This format allows you to display a series of scrollable images instead of just a single image.
This type of advertising is great for brands with visual elements, such as food industry, furniture sales, fashion, vacation destinations, car dealerships, etc. But Instagram is not just for those businesses, the platform can also help to personalize your brand or show your culture by showing people what is behind your software or financial company.
The string format allows you to select up to 10 images in an ad, each with a unique link. Videos are also an option for these ads.
Technical requirements
- File type: jpg or png
- Maximum file size: 30 MB
- Minimum image width: 600 pixels
- Image ratio: minimum 4: 5, maximum of 16: 9
- Text length: up to 2,200 (* although Instagram recommends staying below 90 for optimal distribution)
- Video length: up to 60 seconds
- Number of hashtags: up to 30 (* you can add them in comments)
The target is supported
- Approach
- Traffic
- Convert
- Brand awareness
- Create leads
- List of sales products
Call to action buttons are supported
- Apply now
- Book now
- Call now
- Contact us
- Download
#6. Advertising on Story canvas
And last, but definitely not least, we have the newest addition to the ad format family, Canvas ads. These ads are truly immersive, allowing advertising to create a 360 VR experience within their story. They only supported via mobile devices, and extremely customizable for the advertiser, but you will need some technical chops. These ads work with images, videos, and carousels. Check out this guide to learn more about Canvas ads.
And last but certainly not least, I will write about the latest in the form of advertising, Canvas advertising. This is a really cool ad that allows you to create a 360 VR experience in the Story section. They are only supported via mobile devices and are extremely customizable for advertisers, but you will need some technical programming. These ads work in the form of images, videos and sequences. Read this link to learn more about Canvas ads!
- Technical requirements:
- Minimum image width: 400 pixels
- Minimum image height: 150 pixels
- Supported goals:
- Approach
- Brand awareness
- Convert
- Create leads
- Interact with any point on the post
- Video views
- Visitors to the store
- Call to action buttons supported:
- Apply now
- Book now
- Contact us
Tips for you: 5 ways to run ads best on Instagram
Now that you have the basic rules for Instagram advertising, it is time to take action to get the highest possible return on investment by following these tips to create a great Instagram ad!
#1. Put personality into each ad
Whether it is a humorous post, an emotional video or just an intriguing image that shows the culture of the business, if your Instagram post does not have a personality then you will not achieve any potential for interactivity on posts.
People use Instagram to entertain, amuse or surprise. Whether it is once you are on the train to work or when you are relaxing after a long day at work, no one wants to jump into Instagram to see a boring ad. This is why getting into emotion is always a good approach. Take this interesting article from Shape Magazine for a perfect example.
#2. Make sure your ad is relevant to the context
Not that anything works with one social media platform, will definitely work on another. For example, a business will not be able to promote the same content through LinkedIn as they do through Twitter, because the audience is often in a different psychological state.
So is Instagram. Put yourself in the mind of your target audience and be aware of their position. On Instagram, do you think your potential customers are able to download and read a 40-page ebook? Probably not. Make sure that your ad does not feel too driven by your sales orientation because this is not the purpose Instagram is used to.
#3. Use Hashtag
Do not just use simple hashtags like #food or #love. Get creative and do some user research to see which hashtags are likely to be searched by your target audience. Also, do not write too many hashtags. This can make your post look a bit sloppy and hopeless.
So, what is the ideal number? TrackMaven analyzed 65,000 posts and found that 9 hashtags are ideal numbers for the highest number of interactions. They also found that longer hashtags usually perform better.
#4. Make a competition
Promoting with a contest or free giveaway is by far one of the most effective ways to reach your goals faster with ads on Instagram. Why is that? Because people like competition and free stuff! What better way to get users excited about your brand?
If you need some help on how to do this, check out this great post on how to run a giveaway program on WordStream’s Instagram.
#5. Post in optimal time frames
I talked a little bit about this in the budgeting step of setting up Instagram ads, and actually using ad scheduling (only available for lifetime budgets) is a great way to reach users at the right time.
If you know your audience well, this is not too difficult to identify, but errors and trials will occur. Take a look at your industry. If you are an online retailer, when do people usually shop for clothes online? Or if you are a car dealer, what days of the week do you see site traffic spike? Asking these questions is a good thing to get started.
You do not need to think more, set up and advertise on Instagram! This is a platform you should not ignore and this guide will give you enough data to become famous on Instagram!