The 8th annual WE-Awards received more than 1,200 entries from across the globe. Our project creating profile pieces for members of local co-working space The Roost not only won recognition, it was given the Award of Excellence for being the very best in its category.

Read the most recent profile on graphic designer Lisa Halliwell here.

See our profile on the Web Excellence Awards website here.

More than 82% of Australians use social media and the average Aussie spends almost two hours a day on social platforms, according to the latest Digital 2022 Australia report by We Are Social.

However, analysis of which social media sites Australians are using reveals that most of the established popular platforms are no longer seeing significant growth in numbers and could risk losing users to the rising competition without fresh ideas.

Here’s how Australian social media is looking in 2023 and what that means for your social marketing campaigns with Civic Web Media’s annual breakdown.

Most popular platforms by number of unique monthly visitors – December 2022

1. 1. Facebook – 18 million (up 1m from December 2021)
   2. YouTube – 17.5 million (up 1m)
   3. WhatsApp – 12 million (steady)
   4. Instagram – 10 million (steady)
   5. LinkedIn – 6.5 million (steady)
   6. Snapchat – 6.4 million (steady)
   7. WordPress – 6.1 million (steady)
   8. Twitter – 5.8 million (steady)
   9. Tinder – 4 million (steady)
   10. Tumblr – 3.7 million (steady)

Statistics compiled by SocialMediaNews.com.au for December 2022. Source: Vivid Social – Social Media Agency. Figures correct as of 31/12/22.

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Top 10 social networks in Australia 2023

1. Facebook

18,000,000 unique active monthly users

Privacy scandals, sinking stocks and record-breaking lawsuits haven’t stopped the social media king from gaining an extra 1 million active Australian users through 2022, maintaining its position as the most popular social media site in Australia and the wider world.

According to the latest global social media statistics compiled by Hootsuite, more than a third of the world’s population and more than half of total internet users use Facebook every month. Two thirds of users visit a local business page at least once a week and one third make purchases on the platform.

Facebook is the most valuable social channel for most businesses in Australia. Read our step-by-step guide to how to advertise on Facebook.

2. YouTube

17,500,000 unique monthly visitors

Also gaining 1 million users to keep pace with Facebook, the world’s largest video platform boasts the most engagement of any social networking site.

Australian YouTube users spend an average of 19 minutes a day or 23.7 hours per month watching videos on the platform, according to Hootsuite, and 70% of users say they purchased from a brand after seeing them advertised on the site.

If you’re looking to make the most of video marketing for your business, see our YouTube marketing guide.

3. WhatsApp

12,000,000 active users

After rapid growth in 2021, the Facebook-owned messaging and video call service saw negligible growth in 2022. However, it remains the most popular messaging app in Australia, ahead of Snapchat and Facebook’s own Messenger.

4. Instagram

10,000,000 active monthly users

Rounding out Australia’s and the world’s top 4 social networks, Instagram saw little to no growth domestically last year. But with more than 1 in 3 Australians being active on the platform, the image and video site is still an effective marketing tool for reaching your customers.

To find out more, read our guide to getting started on Instagram.

5. LinkedIn

6,500,000 active monthly users

Despite no significant growth in two years, the professional social network remains a popular tool for recruitment and B2B marketing in Australia. LinkedIn reports that around 10 million Australians have accounts on the site, though fewer are regular users.

Read our guide to getting started on LinkedIn as a business.

6. Snapchat

6,400,000 active monthly users

Stable for three years, Snapchat still retains a loyal user base, but is failing to grow in the face of competitors such as TikTok. According to Hootsuite, the image and video messaging app is most popular with young adults aged 18-24, and users spend an average of 7 minutes per day on the platform.

7. WordPress

6,100,000 monthly users

WordPress has also not grown significantly since 2020, but the open-source CMS is still the leading website builder for individuals and businesses in Australia who want a simple and customisable website.

8. Twitter

5,800,000 active monthly users

Despite the headlines and controversy since Elon Musk took full control of the platform in October, use of Twitter in Australia neither grew nor declined significantly in 2022, but it remains popular, particularly with males and millennials.

Find out how to reach your audience on Twitter with Civic Web Media’s Twitter marketing guide for small businesses.

9. Tinder

4,000,000 users (estimate)

A decade on from its launch, Tinder is still the most popular dating and lifestyle app in Australia, but saw relatively little growth in 2022 as younger users were lured by rivals such as Bumble and Thursday.

10. Tumblr

3,700,000 monthly users

Still rounding out the top 10, a loyal and predominantly female audience is keeping the image sharing and blogging site relevant in Australia.

Other platforms to watch

While no social network looks set to dethrone Facebook in the near future, other apps have grown more rapidly in recent years, particularly TikTok. The video sharing app almost doubled its Australian user base to 2 million active monthly users in 2022, predominantly in the 13-17 age group.

The Chinese language networks WeChat, RenRen and Weibo are also popular among Australia’s Chinese community, with an estimated 2.9 million active monthly users on WeChat alone.

For more industry news and online marketing tips, follow the Civic Web Media blog.

Founded in 2015, we’ve been helping our clients craft and develop some of the most engaging and unique content for their businesses. We want them to get more out of the internet through our well-written content. With that being said, our continued passion for the content marketing industry has managed to blossom into an amazing Clutch award for the second year running.

Read more: See how we helped City of Newcastle promote the best startups in town.

We are excited to announce that we’ve been recently named as one of the 2022 leading agencies for content marketing in Australia by Clutch. Clutch is an established platform in the heart of Washington, DC, committed to helping small, mid-market, and enterprise businesses identify and connect with the service providers they need to achieve their goals.

To officially receive this award, here is our Senior Editor, Oliver Gaywood: “2021 has been a tough year for many reasons, but we’re delighted that we’ve been able to help our clients come through in a positive way. This is a huge milestone for us and we can’t wait to showcase more of our talents and services these coming years.”

Let’s turn your ideas into reality. Get in touch and let us know how we can help you reach your goals.

All homebuyers are recommended to get a building and pest inspection done on a property, so there’s plenty of work available. But how do you get new customers? Blogging may be one of the best ways to climb Google rankings and get new leads. We look at how it can help and see how one local company — Ascert Building Inspections Newcastle — has implemented it into their strategy.

Blogging creates more content for your site

One of the most important factors in search rankings is content. The more relevant content you have on your site, the more likely you are to rank well.

A standard website has 12 or so pages and that’s all Google and potential customers have to judge you on. If you add one blog post a month, within a year your site will have twice as much content – and they’ll have twice as much to judge you on.

By posting once a week, your site will grow quickly and you’ll be able to show readers relevant information for a wide range of related topics.

More content improves your SEO

When people want to hire a building inspector, they’re most likely to turn to Google. And if you’re not near the top of the search results, it’s unlikely that they’ll find their way to your site.

Blogging helps you get there.

Google ranks websites based on keywords — the terms people use to search for you. Whether it’s a simple search for a ‘building inspector in Newcastle’ or something more specific like the ‘cost of a building inspection’, by writing articles that give readers information about what you do, you’re more likely to bring new customers to your site.

Of course, choosing the right keywords is an important part of this process but it’s easier than you might think.

Articles build trust

Getting more people to your site is the first step in getting a new customer, but the work’s not done yet.

First, you need to make sure the content you’re providing is useful. While it’s sometimes possible to game Google, cheap tricks won’t fool a home buyer. You need to make sure you write something that helps them, in turn building your reputation and their trust in you.

If someone trusts you, they’re much more likely to get in touch.

Building inspectors who are blogging well

As an example of how to do this well, you just need to see who’s ranking for popular search terms.

Ascert Building Inspections has started strongly in its blogging journey. Although the site was only set up in 2022, you can see the blog is full of information that’s important for its target market. Topics like ‘How long does a building and pest inspection take?’ and ‘What fails a building inspection?’ answer some of the most common questions homebuyers have about the industry.

The plan’s simple. Potential customers search Google. Google shows them the Ascert site. They read, learn about the company and begin trust to them. Then all it takes is a phone call or email to get a new client.

Many recent updates to Facebook have been aimed at improving its reputation, such as helping users to secure their accounts and promoting support services during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Businesses have also been well catered for, with new features helping to make social media marketing simpler and more effective. Here are some of the most significant changes from the past year that SMBs should know about.

Dynamic ads

As social shopping becomes more common, users are reportedly more comfortable with ads in their feeds, especially when they’re relevant to their interests. Facebook’s new Dynamic ads use machine learning to display truly personalised ads to users, based on their history of interactions with other ads.

The algorithm determines the most appropriate messaging, location and call to action when displaying precision-targeted ads. Facebook claims that Dynamic ads offer a 34% improved return on advertising spend (ROAS) and lower costs compared to standard carousel ads.

Groups marketing

Since opening Groups to businesses in 2017, Facebook has introduced a wide range of tools to help brands market to their captive audience. This has become increasingly important since Facebook shifted to a more community-driven platform in 2019 and Groups became its primary focus.

Joining Groups or creating your own can be a big commitment, but the rewards will be a more engaged audience, who may be more receptive to visiting your site and making in-app purchases, and greater prominence in feeds. Facebook now allows ads in Groups, as of 2021.

Messenger updates

Facebook Messenger is becoming a more effective marketing tool every year. 2019 saw the introduction of a wealth of new features for businesses, including automated workflows for lead generation, in-app appointment booking to increase conversions and Stories ads displayed in Messenger.

Last year saw Facebook give brands a 24-hour time limit to reply to users’ questions in Messenger, encouraging businesses to respond promptly or lose a potential customer. New messaging tags has made it easier to notify users about deliveries, events and other specifics, while the long-awaited launch of the Messenger desktop app has brought even more people to the platform.

Creator Studio updates

Creator Studio is the central hub where users publish and manage Facebook video content. In February, Facebook released Creator Studio as a standalone mobile app with a streamlined interface for easier management on the move. The past year has also seen the range of tools in Creator Studio expanded to include new monetisation options, more detailed analytics and integration with Instagram and IGTV to simplify cross-platform video marketing.

If you’re not already promoting your business on Facebook, or you’re not using it to its full potential, you could be missing out on your biggest local audience and highly targeted advertising tools. Find out what you need to know about Facebook for business by reading our Facebook advertising guide.

Since we were founded, Civic Web Media has aimed to help local businesses reach their goals by using well-written copy, blog writing and newsletter creation. Not only do we help them understand what content marketing is but we also work hand-in-hand to help them realise their goals. 

We work hard to do this, so we’re extremely happy to receive any appreciation and recognition for our efforts. This year, that comes in the form of an award. Our services have been showcased on Clutch, and we’ve been named one of the top content marketing companies in Australia.

Clutch is a Washington, DC-based company that curates reviews for B2B companies all over the world. Their team of analysts processes every review with keen eyes for details and accuracy, verifying each so that only the best businesses emerge on top. Thanks to our wonderful customers, we’ve been rated highly on their platform. 

It’s an amazing feeling for a Newcastle-based agency to win a national award like this. Everyone involved with Civic Web Media has been working hard for the past few years and it’s great that our efforts are being noticed.

— Oliver Gaywood, co-founder.

Our team members are truly amazed and inspired by this recognition. Reviews on our Clutch profile, such as below, are greatly appreciated, too.

Since 2015, Civic Web Media has helped Australian and international businesses unlock their full potential through the power of content marketing. As years go by, we only get more inspired and dedicated to creating content that helps brands speak to their audience. 

If you need content marketing services or have any inquiries about our work, check out our case studies or contact us via admin@civicwebmedia.com.au

Google has become synonymous with search for most Australians – accounting for 98% of mobile search traffic and 90% of desktop searches in 2018, according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

Life without Google would take some adjustment, but the leading alternative – Microsoft’s search engine Bing – is the next best thing. Bing search is similar enough to Google that it should feel familiar even for people who’ve never used it before, but there are a few notable differences in the ways Bing and Google index pages.

If your websites are exclusively optimised based on Google’s rules, you could benefit from making a few tweaks to make sure you don’t lose traffic and give you a boost over your less prepared competitors.

Bing SEO vs Google SEO: key differences

The good news for marketers is that Bing and Google use most of the same ranking signals when determining which content to display in organic search, so the time and money you’ve put into optimising your business website for Google won’t be wasted.

Both search engines recognise high quality, relevant website content and punish pages that use black hat schemes like keyword spamming. Keywords, backlinks and other traditional SEO staples are also important for Bing SEO.

However, there are some differences that could impact on your site’s performance if it’s not optimised for the ranking signals that Microsoft’s search engine favours. These are the major differences you should be aware of. Some of the main differences with SEO for Bing include:

• Keyword optimisation
• Local search
• Multimedia search
• Backlinks
• Social signals
• User experience
• Sitemaps

Keyword optimisation

Google SEO has become more complex in recent years as the search algorithm has become less focused on exact match keywords and more adept at recognising user intent from related search terms. Not so for Bing, where targeting specific keywords can still help you to climb the ranks – as long as you don’t overdo it.

Also unlike Google, keywords carry weight in meta tags on Bing. Including keywords in page titles, domain names and title tags can all help you to target users for specific search terms.

Local search

Bing and Google both give a boost to local results when a user searches for products and services available nearby. The difference is that Bing prioritises location, so it’s more likely to highlight small businesses in the area than Google, which tends to display more established local businesses first.

Multimedia search

One area where Bing is ahead of the game is its ability to search images, video, audio and other multimedia features, including page elements running Flash which Google ignores. This ‘entity understanding’ could make a big difference if your content is less text-based.

Backlinks

Links pointing to your pages from other websites can improve your standing on Bing, much as they do on Google. A difference is that Bing gives particular emphasis to links from older and more established sites, especially if the domain contains a .gov, .org or .edu.

Social signals

Bing puts more emphasis on social media shares and influence than Google ever has. If your content gets a lot of interaction on Facebook, Twitter or other platforms – especially within a user’s own networks – these all contribute towards its search ranking.

User experience

User engagement is a ranking factor on Google, but it may hold even more sway on Bing. If your pages offer a good user experience and visitors tend to stick around, this will improve their search ranking. On the other hand, pages that are slow to load or that visitors abandon quickly can plummet down the ranks.

Sitemaps

While Google may index every page on your website eventually, Bing focuses on key pages and indexes these less often. You can give the search engine a helping hand by tying your pages together in a good linking structure, making sure 301 redirects are in place and configuring your crawl settings in Bing Webmaster Tools.

How to optimise for Bing

In summary, you can improve your chances of reaching customers on Bing by optimising your SEO approach in these ways:

• Targeting specific keywords in content, titles, headings and meta tags
• Including your location for local search
• Including quality images and video in content
• Having at least one backlink per page, ideally from an authoritative site
• Publishing shareworthy content and encouraging social interaction
• Checking analytics to improve click through rates and user engagement
• Organising your website structure and redirects

According to Bing Webmaster Guidelines, the most important criteria for its algorithm when ranking pages are, in approximate order:

• Relevance
• Quality/credibility
• User engagement
• Freshness
• Location
• Page load time

Bing also highlights certain activities that will negatively impact your search ranking and may lead to penalties, including:

• Cloaking – showing different versions of a page to users and search crawlers
• Link buying and social media schemes
• Plagiarised or duplicated content
• Machine-generated content
• Keyword stuffing and misleading page markup
• Malicious activity and harmful content

Do I need to update my website?

Whether Google reaches an agreement with news organisations, as happened in France, or it withdraws like it did from China, reviewing your website SEO to target multiple search engines will make sure you’re prepared for all eventualities.

If your site is optimised for Google alone, this won’t just mean taking a hit if the company withdraws. You’ll also be missing out on the significant minority of users that already use Bing as their default or preferred search engine, including many older internet users and users who prefer visual search.

For more industry news and online marketing tips, follow the Civic Web Media Blog.

Firing off a tweet isn’t a big time investment, but a successful Twitter marketing campaign takes a lot of planning and dedication, and most small businesses feel they don’t have the time or resources. If you’re debating whether Twitter marketing is worth it for you, here are the basics you need to know.

Optimise your profile

Getting your Twitter profile right is important for making a good impression and making sure more people find you. The key elements are:

• Handle – your @username should be your business name or a minor variation if it’s taken by someone else. This should be consistent with your other social media profiles.
• Profile image – this appears next to every tweet, so it should be identifiable. Most companies use a version of their logo or a photo of their CEO.
• Header image – your background image can communicate your brand’s personality or a current offer. It can be changed as often as you want to keep things fresh.
• Bio – the concise description of your business or mission statement. Limited to 160 characters (like this bullet point), you need to make every character count.
• Website link – include a link to your homepage under your bio. You can also include your company’s birthday here.
• Location – tell your followers where you’re located. This is especially important for local marketing.
• Verification – you need to be fairly established before you can apply for account verification, but this helps to increase authority and trust.

Post engaging content

If you’re already marketing on Facebook, Twitter isn’t too dissimilar, but there are some differences to keep in mind when writing content fit for your followers.

• Keep it short – Twitter increased its character limit from 140 to 280 characters a few years back (the length of this bullet point). This gives more space for your marketing message, but could still mean learning to write short and snappy if you’re more used to other platforms.
• Make it shareable – Twitter thrives on reposts (retweets). Posts that are original, interesting or entertaining are more likely to be shared. Market research will give you ideas about what your audience is interested in.
• Have conversations – Twitter isn’t a one-way street. Aim to start or chime in on ongoing discussions, splitting your response over multiple tweets if necessary.
• Be visual – posts with images, GIFs and videos get more attention and engagement than plain text, as well as fitting more information into a single tweet. Videos should be short and to the point and should also contain text, since many people have the sound muted.
• Be consistent – people will come to know your brand’s tone and personality, so aim for consistency even if multiple people use the account. Post as often as you can, at times when your audience is most engaged.
• Involve your audience – asking questions and running polls and contests with prizes encourages people to interact with your business.

Optimise your content

Users search on Twitter for answers, news and trending topics, so SEO principles apply. On Twitter, this mainly means:

• Target keywords – decide what keywords you want to rank for and use these (and variations) consistently in your tweets.
• Include a CTA – if you want users to take an action after reading your post, whether it’s to follow you or visit your website, make this clear with a call to action.
• Use hashtags – Twitter popularised the hashtag that lets you align your posts with trending topics or create your own category. Twitter recommends limiting hashtags to 1 or 2 per tweet.

We’ve written a whole series on this, telling you everything you need to know about hashtags.

Engage with your followers

If you use Twitter as an advertising billboard, you’re not going to win over many followers. You need to get involved and treat your followers how you want to be treated. This means:

• Respond to questions, comments and direct messages as promptly as possible (you can get away with checking messages once daily)
• Retweet posts from your followers or other accounts you follow that are relevant to your brand and your audience
• Listen to the most important conversations on and off Twitter so you can give your business’ response (if appropriate)
• Talk to your followers by hosting a Twitter Chat at an agreed time, if there’s a topic you all want to talk about
• Sort through the noise of your busy feed by setting up Twitter Lists to categorise conversations according to account or topic

Using Twitter for promotion

While most of your time on Twitter will be spent growing your audience and your reputation, it’s also a valuable promotional tool when used sparingly.

• Include links to your website in relevant tweets and your bio
• Retweet other users’ posts that mention you
• Add a Twitter social button to your website, your email signature and other profiles
• Consider embedding your Twitter Timeline on your website
• Create landing pages for your Twitter promotions to increase conversions

Analyse your success

You’ll have detailed insights into how well your Twitter marketing is going with the platform’s extensive analytics tools, covering areas such as:

• Engagement – how many people interact with specific posts
• Impressions – how often you appear in feeds
• Hashtags – how many times your custom hashtags are used

This data and more will help you decide whether Twitter marketing is worth it, bearing in mind that like all organic digital marketing, it takes time to build the momentum.

Paid advertising

If you want faster results from Twitter than organic marketing can provide, you can sign up for paid ads. Twitter claims that users spend 26% more time viewing ads on the platform compared to the other major platforms. The options are:

• Twitter Ads – promote your account to gain followers, increase website traffic or other goals
• Promoted Tweets – promote selected tweets to your target audiences
• Influencer marketing – work with influential personalities to promote your brand to their followers

Twitter adds new features for businesses every year, so you should keep updated with the latest marketing tools. Read more social media marketing tips in the Civic Web Media blog.

In 2020, the B2B platform boasts almost 700 million members in 50 million businesses. This includes more than 11 million users in Australia, where LinkedIn is more popular than Twitter. However, while most companies have a presence on LinkedIn, they don’t do much on the platform outside of networking and recruitment.

While it doesn’t offer the mass reach of Facebook, LinkedIn’s business-minded audience and tools can make it the best platform for B2B marketing. You can build awareness of your brand, grow your reputation and drive more traffic to your website, among other goals.

Try these LinkedIn marketing tips to see how the professional social network can work for your business.

Optimise your profile and pages

Your LinkedIn profile represents your business on the site, so it needs to look professional and up to date. You’ll also want to make sure it shows up in searches when people are looking for a business like yours.

• Establish your branding by using your company name, logo and a custom URL, rather than the default string of numbers.
• Add links to your website, other social networks and any content you want to promote.
• Upload a background photo that represents your brand. Images should be sized 1584 x 396 pixels for the best fit on desktop.
• Organise your profile sections to prioritise what you want people to see and hide what you don’t.
• Make sure your profile is set to public so it will be visible and searchable.
• Create pages to show examples of the different things your company does or appeal to your different audience segments.
• Use SEO techniques to target the keywords you want your business to rank for.
• Update your profile and pages regularly with fresh content and recent examples of your work to show you’re still active on the site.

Grow your network

Whether you’ve just signed up to LinkedIn or you want to expand your network, the platform offers plenty of ways to make new connections and build relationships.

• Import your email contacts and other existing contacts to find their LinkedIn profiles (you can also export LinkedIn connections for use in other campaigns).
• Check who’s viewed your profile or pages to see who’s interested in your business.
• Upgrade to a Premium account so you can message users outside of your contacts on the Open Profile network or InMail.
• Limit access to who can see your connections to hide this information from competitors.

Join and create Groups

LinkedIn Groups are communities centred around industries, locations and other mutual interests. Members of a Group can post and comment on content, view each other’s profiles and send a limited number of private messages to members per month.

Contributing to Groups that are relevant to your business can build your reputation, awareness of your brand and your contact list. For more authority, you can also create your own Group and promote it to your connections.

Share and engage with content

Posting content on LinkedIn lets you share your expertise and company news with your contacts and other users who come across it.

Whether this is a simple status update or insights reposted from your business blog, sharing content has many benefits, including:

• keeping you in your followers’ feeds
• promoting your products and services
• establishing your authority and expertise
• improving your LinkedIn search ranking

As well as text posts, other types of content perform well on LinkedIn, including:

• Images – as on other social networks, visual content such as image collages often have more engagement than text.
• Video – LinkedIn recommends that videos are kept short (ideally 1 to 2 minutes), the exception being live streaming videos that LinkedIn says generate 24 times more comments than standard video.
• Documents – sharing PDFs, PowerPoint presentations and other files to showcase your business or help fellow businesses to solve a problem.

Your content can be targeted to specific audience segments to make sure it’s relevant to their interests. You can target specific accounts by including @mentions with their username.

As well as posting your own content, it’s also important to take the time to read other people’s contributions that appear in your news feeds. Leaving comments and sharing their content on your own feed will show that you’re engaged and open to networking.

Cross-platform marketing

Since not everyone browses LinkedIn for their content fix, reposting your LinkedIn content to your other social networks – and vice versa – will help you reach more people and improve the returns on your content marketing investment.

• If your company is on Twitter, you can synchronise LinkedIn status updates across both platforms.
• Post a link to your latest LinkedIn content on Facebook.
• Add a LinkedIn Follow button to your website, blog, email signature and other profiles.
• Link to your LinkedIn pages to improve their search ranking.
• Promote your business blog in your LinkedIn feed.

Check analytics

Like most platforms, LinkedIn has native analytics tools that show you how well your content is performing. You can check the engagement of individual posts as well as your overall Content Marketing Score, a calculation of various metrics.

Comparing your strengths and weaknesses and seeing what’s trending will give you ideas for how to improve your campaigns and make meaningful connections with more professionals in your industry.

Ads and Sponsored Content

LinkedIn also offers paid advertising options if you want to connect with professionals faster than through an organic campaign. The two approaches are:

• Sponsored Content – promote your best content to the most receptive audiences using LinkedIn’s precision targeting.
• Ad campaigns – manage Message Ads, Dynamic Ads and Text Ads through LinkedIn’s Campaign Manager platform.

Setting your budget and campaign goals helps to keep your LinkedIn advertising spend in check, and you can track the success of your sponsored content and ad campaigns in real time to see if the investment is worth it.

Read more social media marketing tips in the Civic Web Media blog.

As a visual platform, Instagram has its own set of rules for social media marketing that businesses need to learn, but it also offers some of the highest engagement of any site. Instagram says 90% of its users follow at least one brand and 60% say they’ve discovered new products through the platform, so you’ll be marketing to a receptive audience.

The key to success on Instagram is authenticity. If you engage with the platform and your audience on their terms, rather than being overly promotional, you can turn engaged followers into loyal customers and eventually brand ambassadors.

Getting started

Setting up an Instagram profile for your business is free and simple. You need to download the Instagram app for your phone, as the desktop version is limited.

You can enter your details or log in with your company’s Facebook account to complete this step automatically. Make sure you use your business email so your new Instagram profile isn’t accidentally linked to your personal Facebook.

The important point is to choose an Instagram Business Account. This lets you include details such as your opening hours and contact details on your profile and gives you access to tools such as paid ads and real-time analytics so you can measure the success of your campaigns.

Types of posts

Before you start posting, you should familiarise yourself with how Instagram works and know your audience so you can plan an effective content strategy. Most types of content can be engaging when they’re done well, and mixing things up will help to keep your followers interested.

Images

The bread and butter of Instagram, image posts may be photos or graphics and can take many forms. Make sure you have permission to use images that you post.

• Products – photos of your products and services shouldn’t be the only content you publish, but you need to show what you’re about. Upcoming and new releases, demonstrations and promotions can all make popular posts, especially with Instagram Checkout rolling out in more territories to let shoppers buy through the app.
• Contests – Instagram’s contest templates are easy to customise to your needs. Giving away freebies and other promotions can get more people talking about your brand.
• Behind the scenes – showing the human face or faces behind your business can strengthen relationships with your followers.
• Instructional posts – whether it’s a step-by-step tutorial, recipe or trustworthy advice, educational content is one of the best performers across all social media and Instagram is no exception.
• Quotes – pairing a great quote from someone you admire with a suitable background image can make for inspiring and shareable posts, though you shouldn’t overdo it.

Video

You can also record, stream and upload videos on Instagram. As the maximum length for a standard video is only 60 seconds (and most users don’t watch beyond 15 seconds), video marketing on Instagram is a very different prospect from YouTube.

Like photos, videos can be edited in the app itself or using other software.

• Boomerang – Boomerangs are very short videos (up to 3 seconds) that loop forwards and backwards. They’re created by taking a rapid sequence of images using the Instagram camera or dedicated Boomerang app.
• Hyperlapse – if you want to record something that takes longer than 60 seconds, Hyperlapse gets around this by letting you speed up the playback between 1x and 12x so it’s the right length to upload.
• Instagram Live – live streaming videos recorded on Instagram can be up to 60 minutes long. This creates opportunities for more substantial content such as product launches, demonstrations and interviews.
• Instagram TV – longer videos can now be published to IGTV, a dedicated area on the Instagram app that also has a stand-alone app. These videos can be up to 10 minutes long for a standard account or 60 minutes for a verified account, but they only display on mobile devices (and in vertical video).

Instagram Stories

Stories are Instagram’s answer to Snapchat’s ephemeral content. Images and video (up to 15 seconds) can be uploaded in a dedicated feed that has more visibility until the content disappears after 24 hours (although with Highlights, it’s now possible to save your best Stories for posterity).

The time-sensitive nature of Stories makes them appealing to users and gives creators an excuse to be less polished in presentation. The format is ideal for temporary offers and more relaxed content that shows off your brand’s personality.

Brands have taken to Stories in a big way, with Instagram saying that one third of the most viewed Stories on the app are from business accounts.

User-generated content

Successful Instagram accounts don’t just know how to create, but also curate. If someone related to your business or industry or who’s following your account posts something interesting or entertaining, you can share this with your followers – using the proper attribution – to show that you’re in touch.

Influencer posts

Influencer marketing is a booming industry, forecast to be worth $5 billion to $6.5 billion in 2020 by HypeAuditor. Influencers are celebrities or other popular Instagram personalities who are paid to promote your brand to their established audience in various ways.

This type of social proof is often more effective than traditional marketing for Instagram’s young user base, but it can be expensive.

Instagram marketing tips

Not all businesses are as well suited to Instagram as others, but when you pay attention to what works on the platform, and how it can be adapted to your business, you can improve your chances of making meaningful connections with users.

Optimise your account

Users visit your profile when they want to know more about your company and what you do, so make sure you include all the important details. Your Instagram bio is limited to 150 characters, which includes the URL to your website, so every character counts.

When uploading your logo or other profile picture, keep in mind that Instagram crops this down to a circle, so make sure no important information is missing at the edges.

Business users can now add targeted hashtags and links to other Instagram profiles you want to promote. You can also feature Story Highlights at the top of your feed that show your brand in your best light.

Optimise your content

You don’t have to be a professional photographer to succeed on Instagram, but with so much competition, your images need to be attractive and worthwhile if you expect them to be shared.

• Image size – use high-resolution images that are at least 1080 pixels at their longest length so they don’t get blown up and look blurry.
• Composition – researching the basics of lighting, colour composition and the rule of thirds will teach you how to intuitively take better photos. Instagram presents square images as standard, so keep this in mind when compositing and editing.
• Filters – Instagram has a range of filters that can enhance your photos, but you might also want to try other editing apps to give you more options and adjustments.
• Captions – image descriptions can be up to 2,200 characters long, but only the first few lines are displayed before opening the post. This is where your most important marketing message or a tempting lead-in should go.
• Call to action – at the end of captions, encourage readers to leave a comment, share your photo or visit your website.
• Location – tagging your location drives more local users to your content and can lead to higher engagement.
• Hashtags – include relevant and trending hashtags in your posts so they’ll show up in more feeds. Read our guides to everything you need to know about hashtags.

Engage with your audience

Businesses can’t afford to be self-serving on a platform as social as Instagram. Taking the time to respond to users’ comments and checking out their content will show your followers that you value them.

Interacting with influencers and other businesses in your field can also help with networking and growing your audience.

Post frequently

Instagram favours quality over quantity, but the average frequency of 6 posts per week can still be intimidating for many businesses used to scheduling a weekly blog post.

Creating a content calendar will help you avoid running out of ideas or repeating the same topics too often, as well as help you prepare in advance for special calendar dates. You should also consider where your audience is located when deciding the best time to publish and schedule posts.

Promote your content

One benefit of producing so much visual content for Instagram is that you’ll have plenty to share on your other social networks. Instagram and Facebook are closely linked, so it’s an easy matter to share your Instagram posts with an even larger audience.

While they might not be such a good fit for your business blog, you should still include links and social share buttons to your Instagram page on your website and in all of your company profiles.

Check your analytics

Instagram Business Accounts include analytics tools to let you see how many people are visiting your profile, which content is performing best and a detailed breakdown of your audience demographics. All of this can be valuable data for improving your ongoing campaigns.

Instagram advertising

Like other social platforms, Instagram also offers paid advertising for Business Accounts. The process will be familiar to businesses that already advertise on Facebook, as Instagram ads are managed through Facebook Ads.

You can choose to promote your existing content or create a new ad. These will be featured in feeds that match your targeted audience, although less prominently than Facebook Ads. Instagram has also introduced Stories ads that can offer higher engagement than standard ads.

Read more social media marketing tips in the Civic Web Media blog.