Insta-Marketing – Use Instagram to Grow Your Business

Written By: Andy Ogg – Editor for Travel Professional NEWS

 

 

You may have heard of it, seen it but are you using Instagram to market your Travel Agency? If not, you should start.

 

Instagram has grown significantly in the past years and with it’s new functionality and insights, marketing your travel business on this social media is a great way to grow your business, meet new clients, and further become a specialist in your niche.

 

Let’s dive into what Instagram is. In October of 2010, Instagram was released to the public as an iOS application. The inception was very successful and the platform instantly became an addition to the growing Social Media networks in existence.

 

The format was simple then and although there is much more functionality in today’s application, it still follows the same functionality: Share a photo and add a caption with hashtags, which are not required, but highly recommended.

 

The simplicity of Instagram is what lead to it’s initial success. Today there are many more functions to the platform that follow suit to Facebook. With Business profiles, insights and “Stories,” Instagram has become a very powerful marketing platform for many individuals, companies and brands.

 

Today, Instagram continues it’s success by just having reached 700 Million users. They didn’t even forecast that much growth for 2017, so it is safe to say, Instagram is continuing it’s powerful place in the Social Media world.

 

With that said, the possibilities of using Instagram to market your business, attract new clients and even solidify your place as a niche specialist is there. Let’s look into 5 reasons that you should be using Instagram to market your agency.

 

Simplicity and Exposure

Many companies have a profile on every Social Media outlet, in fact, it’s almost a necessity in todays times. Instagram is no different, the benefits that Instagram offers is that it still offers an organic reach via followers, hashtags and location pinning.

 

If you are traveling in Cancun for example and take a photo of a picturesque beach or scene, that is fantastic content to share everywhere but especially on Instagram. The use of the built in filters on Instagram can make a good picture appear FANTASTIC and with the use of relevant hashtags, your reach extends far past your followers and out into the world.

 

Some applicable hashtags of a beach shot in Cancun could be #cancun #paradise #travel #adventure #beach #bucketlist and so on. If you are using a unique hashtag for your agency, such as #abctravel, it should always be included in every photo you share on Instagram.

 

Interaction = Growth

Spending time on Instagram can be easy to do. With the highly visual content, it’s easy to start somewhere, say an image of downtown Chicago, and quickly end up at an image of the finest “secret” restaurants in Chicago. The flow of Instagram leads users to spend more time looking through images than say Facebook or Twitter.

 

Commenting on images and interacting with users of Instagram has shown to be extremely successful in reaching more followers, exposure and interactions on your content. If someone comments positively on one of your images, make sure to reply and let them know you appreciate it. Viewers of the photo will see the repetition of your username and more than likely choose to follow or engage with you.

 

If you spend some time interacting on Instagram, you’ll receive more followers, likes and interactions from users, it is that simple.

 

Hashtags – Tying it all together

At CruiseWorld 2016, I co-hosted a session on hashtags and although I attempted to make it as easy as possible, it can be a hard concept to grasp because of the versatility and open ended engagement.

 

Here is a simple breakdown. A hashtag ties content such as videos and images together under a common #hashtag like #beach #cancun #city #travel #travelprofessional. Under that hashtag, content from all over the world is unified. Think of it as a protocol for organizing data. Using applicable hashtags relevant to the image and content will drive engagement and increase the number of people that choose to follow you.

 

Showcase Your Offerings

With each major supplier providing access to thousands of high quality images, finding a truly amazing image to post every couple of days shouldn’t be much work. Show prospective clients and users of Instagram what you do and how you can help them experience the images you share.

 

Focus on your niche and specialties, and in each photo description and share that you are an EXPERT on this! Creating a successful Instagram profile doesn’t mean you have to be the best photographer, it could mean that you have an eye for what future clients are looking for.

 

Have FUN!

Instagram, with a somewhat simple basis, is fun. In fact, on average users spend 20 minutes a day on Instagram, making it the 3rd ranking social media outlet in terms of time spent per day behind YouTube and Facebook.

 

Instagram lends itself to endless possibilities for a Travel Professional as the hashtag #travel rated 34th in terms of popularity and frequency of use out of EVERY hashtag out there! That is a whole lot of users that are traveling, interested in travel or have the desire to travel.

 

Get out there and start Insta-Marketing your Travel Agency today! #TravelProfessionalsROCK!