With over 400 million accounts and 80 million posts daily, Instagram has become one of the most captivating platforms for advertisers worldwide. So, it comes as no surprise that businesses, both small and large, rely on the social media platform to promote their products. There is no better way to reach the masses.
Call it what you will, but Instagram users don’t necessarily stop and interact with the social media account holder. They’re more accustomed to glancing at posts than reading and scrolling through their feed.
10 Tips to Create Effective Instagram Videos for Business
So, what can you do to make your brand stand out? Regardless of what video format you use, here are 10 tips to enhance its effectiveness to promote your business.
Tip 1: Make the most use out of the first seconds
As mentioned earlier, Instagram users don’t take the time or effort to pause and watch every video on their feeds from start to finish. So, you will need to grasp your audience’s attention within the first three seconds.
Do not with a slow opener that gradually opens the door to the product. Instead, wow the viewers by opening with bright, eye-catching colors with lots of movement. It is important to do this so the audience knows while quickly scrolling down their feed that your post is not just a still image. If there are no transitions or movements at the start, users will scroll on by without hesitance.
Tip 2: Establish clear goals
Instagram videos can last anywhere between 3 and 60 seconds, so you must make every second count as much as possible. Take the time and effort to plan every stage of your video. Start by asking what the ultimate goal of sharing your video is—gaining new Instagram followers, driving traffic to your website, or creating personal relationships with your followers?
In the end, your goal should be as specific as possible. Use the correct tone to your video that coincides with the video’s primary focus.
Tip 3: Get your message across without relying on audio
By default, Instagram videos are set to mute. To grab the user’s attention, consider adding captions with captivating effects highlighting the points that reinforce your brand’s message. Short captions can arouse interest and get the audience to watch the short video in its entirety.
Plus, as many people scroll their Instagram during work and before bed, it’s important that you include text for when people can’t unmute your video. However, too much text and the video can be overwhelming, cluttered, in generally unpleasant to watch.
Tip 4: Identify and solve a problem
The Instagram video ad should point out an existing problem and show how the promoted product or service aims to resolve it. Identifying a unique problem can create an emotional bond with your customer base.
Consider this to be the hook—after you’ve piqued their interest by showing them a problem they can relate to, all that’s left is to demonstrate how your product or service can resolve it once and for all.
Tip 5: Use natural lighting
Although it would be nice to hire a professional photographer and rent a studio, Instagram video ads don’t need to be 100 percent perfect. There is one simple way to improve the quality of portrait-style videos—namely, use natural lighting.
Find a place in your home or workshop close to a window. Allowing sunlight to shine directly toward you can create a radiance of confidence that your viewers need. Feel free to express your creativity by utilizing white poster boards as reflectors or black plastic to eliminate unnecessary lighting.
Tip 6: Tease the launching of new products
Consider announcing it via a teaser video that offers a sneak peek at the soon-to-be-released product. A teaser creates hype for your new product that causes the audience to wonder what it can do before its release date.
Mini-trailers and teasers can help showcase the benefits and features of an upcoming product. On its launch date, broadcast your product on Instagram Live to further increase the hype.
Tip 7: #UseHashtags
Instagram posts that make use of hashtags can receive considerably more engagement as opposed to their hashtag-less counterparts. Before publishing the video post, try to incorporate between three and six hashtags by integrating them in the comment or adding them after at least one space after the paragraph to not distract readers from the main body of text.
Tip 8: Use the correct video format
Instagram allows for two video file formats—MP4 and MOV. The MP4 format is the international standard. Ideally, you should H.264 MP4, which doesn’t take much memory while also maintaining excellent video playback quality. MOV is an Apple-only video file format that’s less compressed but has much better video quality.
Now, the main problem is users whose phones record in MKV format. If this is the case, you’ll need to convert the videos to either MP4 or MOV. Here is an excellent, free online video converter you can use.
Tip 9: Simplify your call to action
One of the fatal mistakes self-promoting businesses make on Instagram is redirecting users to their profile page before sending them to the company’s landing page. The call to action should be as simple as possible by eliminating unnecessary steps.
If users are interested in your brand’s products, then give them a direct link to where they can seek additional information. Generally speaking, if a user doesn’t find what they’re looking for in more than three clicks or taps, they’ll most likely move on.
Tip 10: Make your landing page mobile-friendly
Although the landing page is outside of Instagram’s jurisdiction, if your call to action redirects them to a landing page, make sure that it’s optimized for all devices. Your audience will become annoyed to find an unappealing interface after taking the time to tap on the “Learn More” button. If you make it difficult for them, there’s a greater chance that a potential customer will not come back in the future.
