How To Promote Your Dropshipping Business On Instagram In 2020

Do you want to know how to promote your business on Instagram without spending a cent? Here are the most promising social media marketing ideas that you definitely need to try in 2020!

Instagram is a great marketing tool which many eСommerce entrepreneurs use to grow their businesses. Since its creation in 2010, it has grown into the ultimate photo and video sharing service that, as of June 2018, had over 1 billion active users per month! What’s more, Instagrammers post about 80 million photos, make and watch 300 million stories, and give more than 1.6 billion likes every day! It is generally agreed that in 2020, this trend will continue and bring huge number of benefits to businesses!

Although these numbers are really impressive, you shouldn’t care about them only. Look at the Instagram users’ behaviour. Most Instagrammers are true shopaholics who like searching for brands and spend much time viewing new goods. 30% of all Instagram users said that they have bought a product after discovering it on Instagram. Thus, Instagram has a very loyal audience that you can easily convert into your buyers. People really love using Instagram and you, as an eCommerce entrepreneur, cannot miss this opportunity to gain new customers and make money on it!

In this article, we’ll describe how to effectively promote your business on Instagram in 2020 and make the most of it. If you’re new to this social network, don’t worry – we’ll start from the very beginning.

Let’s go!

How to promote your business on Instagram: 4 preparatory steps

To start your promotional activity, you first of all need to prepare your Instagram account for it. To do it, follow the next 4 steps.

1. Install the app

There are 2 ways to create an Instagram account: you can use a smartphone or a desktop computer. If you choose the first way, download the Instagram app from Google Play (Android) or from the App Store (iPhone) and install it on your phone. If you’ve decided to create an account from your desktop computer, just go to instagram.com.

When creating an account, don’t forget that you’re making a business account! Do not write your own name and do not use your personal mailbox! Here, you should enter the information that is related to your eCommerce business only! Choosing the right name for your account is very important because it will be displayed in your profile and near all the comments you will leave.

However, it may happen that the desired username is already used by someone. Don’t panic! Just add any symbols such as an underscore mark that will make your name different. Try a number of options and choose the most eye-catching one!

2. Edit your Instagram profile

After creating an Instagram account, you need to edit it and add more details about your store. Here, you should focus on 2 boxes: website and bio.

With the first box, everything is clear. Just copy the URL of your store and paste it into the box.

Creating a great Instagram bio takes more effort. This small box has a significant impact on people’s first impression – if your bio is interesting, there are more chances that Instagram users will start following you. Otherwise, you can lose them forever.

Let’s look at what you need to do in order to make a great Instagram bio:

• Write a short description that represents your business. Your visitors should know what you offer.

• Name your main benefits and include numbers if necessary.

• Add an emoji to spice up your Instagram bio and make it more attractive and friendly.

Great job! Save your progress!

After that, you need to upload your profile photo. You can use the logo of your store or you can create a special picture that will fully represent your business.

Now, we need to turn our Instagram account into a business one. However, we cannot do it without a special Facebook business page.

3. Make a Facebook Business account

If you already have a Facebook Business page, skip this step and go straight to the next one. Otherwise, read the following instructions very carefully.

• Go to Facebook, sign in to your account and choose the “Create Page” option.

You will see 2 types of business pages: “Business or brand” and “Community or public figure”. Choose the first one because it is perfectly suitable for online stores, and click on the “Get started” button.

• In the opened window, you will need to type the name of your store and choose a category. We recommend you to name this page the same way as your Instagram account. As for the category, select this one that you’ll find the most suitable.

• Then, Facebook will recommend you to upload a profile picture and a cover photo. Make sure that these pictures have a high quality, and add them to your Facebook business page. If you haven’t made these pictures yet, just skip these steps and come back to them later.

• After that, you need to create a unique username that actually will be the URL of your business page. We recommend you to write the name of your store.

• Then, edit your page info. For this purpose, click on the dots near the ‘Share’ button, choose the “Edit Page Info” option, and fill in all the necessary fields.

Now, your Facebook Business page is ready to use. Of course, there are many things that you can change or improve, but it is not the purpose of this article. However, we’ll return to this issue next time.

4. Turn your Instagram account into a business account

So, you have created an Instagram account and a Facebook business account. In order to promote your business on Instagram and get more functions, you need to switch your Instagram account to the business mode.

It lets you:

• Choose the type of your account (brand, online store, etc.)
• Select how to stay in touch with your customers (via emails, direct messages or by phone);
• Analyze what type of content is the most popular and successful;
• Promote your store according to your preferred settings (age, gender, location);
• Create and run Instagram advertising campaigns.

In order to turn your profile into a business account, go to the menu, click on the “Switch to business profile” option and press the “Continue” button.

Now, you need to connect your Instagram account to the Facebook page, which we have already made in the previous step.

Edit your profile and add some details such as email, phone numbers or address. If you do it, people will be able to connect with you just by clicking on the buttons in your profile.

My congratulations! Your account is ready to work! Let’s learn how to use it to promote your business on Instagram and make the most of it!

4 smart strategies to give your business a boost on Instagram [Detailed how-to’s]

Earlier, we’ve discussed 7 free methods of promoting your business on Instagram. Today, we will talk about 4 extra strategies: while they may require a bit more preparation, their efficiency is totally worth your effort.

1. How to promote your business on Instagram automatically with Social Rabbit plugin

You’ve probably heard about Social Rabbit – the plugin that enables the so-called “smart posting”. We regularly use it to promote our stores on social media and, you know, it really helps us grow traffic. You can successfully use it, too – consider the fact it has a FREE 7-day trial period!

So, install it on your website and sign in your Instagram account.

Social Rabbit has many features, but, in order to promote your business on Instagram, you need to focus on the following options:

• Poster

This tool will automatically publish the pictures of your store products to your Instagram account. All you need is to make a template, choose the time of posting and add some hashtags that will be associated with your brand.

• Gallery

When we want to post other pictures or short videos to our Instagram feed (memes, thematic images or just beautiful photos), we use the Gallery tool. Thanks to this tool, we can upload all the desired files to our media gallery and set up the necessary promotion options. What’s more, we can write short texts that will be included in the posts with Gallery pictures.

• Promoter

Promoter can help you draw attention to your account by following, liking and commenting the most popular accounts related to your niche. Just write the necessary keywords into the search box and choose the accounts you want to follow.

Who knows, maybe, thanks to Promoter, you will not only get likes, but also find new friends or business partners?

2. How to promote your business on Instagram with giveaways

Another way to promote your business on Instagram is to use Instagram Giveaways.

In simple terms, a giveaway is a gift that a company or a brand gives to its subscribers for doing certain actions (likes, comments, etc.). As a rule, all companies use giveaways to promote new products, encourage people to share new posts and grow Instagram following.

Let’s learn how to run an Instagram Giveaway successfully.

1. Identify your main goal

Before creating a giveaway, decide what you want to get – more Instagram followers, likes, website visitors, email subscribers, etc. Your giveaway should bring benefits not only to your followers but to you as well.

2. Choose the prize

Now, you need to choose the product that will have a great value to your audience. We recommend you to study the list of your bestsellers and pick something demanded by your audience. Remember, people should be interested to take a part in your giveaway, so pick a product that is not very cheap!

3. Think of the the giveaway terms

Decide what people should do to get a prize. As a rule, companies ask people to subscribe, like a post and leave a comment. This method works well, but nowadays, it is a bit overused. That’s why it’s a good idea to try thinking outside the box and be creative. If you have no ideas, there are a lot of websites that you can look through to see what kind of giveaways get people excited.

4. Determine the duration of your giveaway

You need to decide on how long your Instagram giveaway will last (several hours, a week or maybe even a month).

The length of your giveaway may depend on the following factors:

• The number of your followers (the more subscribers you have, the longer a giveaway should be);
• Time zones (not all your followers are likely to live in the same time zone).

5. Promote your Instagram giveaway

If you really want to reach a large audience with giveaways, take care of your promotion strategy. Here are some things to consider:

• Announce your giveaway before it starts. Let your audience know that something interesting is coming soon, but at the same time, keep them in suspense.
• Try to make friends with other bloggers in your niche and ask them to advertise your account or your contest.
• Send advertising emails to your audience and remind them about your giveaway.
• Provide regular updates on how much time is left.

Once your Instagram giveaway has ended, you’ll need to pick a winner. Copy and paste all the names of eligible entrants into a randomizer, get the name of your winner and contact this person to arrange delivery of his or her prize.

After that, don’t forget to spread the news about the winner! Otherwise, people may think that your contest is not fair and you’re a liar 🙁

In addition, after giving a gift, you may ask the winner to take a photo of your gift, post it and write some words about his or her experience. So, this giveaway will bring you new followers or clients even after its end!

3. How to promote your business on Instagram with Shoutouts

Take a couple of hours to find Instagrammers who work within your niche, and ask them for collaborations. You can make one template and send it to all the influencers you would like to partner with. Most bloggers try to make money on collaborations, but there is a great part of them who will be ready to work for free. Be proactive and you will find these great guys 😉

If you want to learn more about Instagram shoutouts, feel free to read our detailed guide.

4. How to promote your business on Instagram with unique content

Social Rabbit is a great tool which will regularly publish pictures from your store or media gallery. It helps you stay in the limelight even if you don’t have much time to deal with your dropshipping store. However, sometimes you have to create your own content to make your account more attractive for your customers.

Here are some ideas of posts you can create to promote your business on Instagram:

• Answers to commonly asked questions

Pay attention to the questions that are often asked by your customers and answer them in the form of Instagram posts.

• Discounts and special offers

As a rule, we congratulate people on different occasions (Christmas, New year, etc.) and give them special offers and discounts. You can do it more often, but in this case, your customers can easily become accustomed to seeing discounts regularly.

• Product reviews

In one of our previous articles we’ve told you how to create product videos and make money on them. If you don’t want to bother yourself with recording a video, you can just take a picture of any product from AliExpress, write a review and post it on Instagram. What’s more, you can ask your friends (or influencers) to publish this review on their accounts.

• Storytelling

If you have an interesting or a funny story to tell, share it with your customers! People will see that you are not just a seller but a person who can become a friend. So the customers’ loyalty will increase and you will get the chance to promote your business on Instagram more successfully. In addition, to make your story more persuasive, you can illustrate it with a couple of Instagram stories.

Here were some tips on how to promote your business on Instagram and grow your audience easily. Keep these tips in mind, believe in yourself and you will see more engagement, more followers and a growing number of customers in a very short period of time!

And what strategies do you use to promote your business on Instagram? Feel free to share them in the comments section below!