How Instagram Videos Can Help Your Marketing Strategy

Instagram is a trend – and if you want to get your business off to a good start, you have to follow suit. But how do you get the most out of your social network? What works best and where are the traps? In this blog, you’ll learn how to use your Instagram videos to skilfully showcase your products or services – or yourself.

First of all you have to distinguish between Instagram videos in the newsfeed and Instagram stories. In the feed, the videos can be between three and 60 seconds long. Stories have a maximum length of 15 seconds. In general, you should set your stories to variety – pictures, boomerangs, videos. You have many possibilities, use them. As is so often the case with social media: It must go fast. If the first seconds aren’t convincing, you can continue scrolling or stop the story immediately. So think about how to pack your followers right away and what will convince them to watch your Instagram video through to the end.

You should pay attention to this in your Instagram videos

As so often – the most important thing is storytelling. Those who provide their users with emotional, captivating, funny or thought-provoking stories with their videos can massively increase the reach of their brand. Emotions should be used to match the image – from an action-packed trip through the Alps to the gentle backdrop of an abandoned beach. Your Instagram videos can also serve as teasers for longer publications. For example, you can attract your users to a Youtube video. Make them curious with a short version and give them a taste of what to expect.

A very important point: The Instagram videos have to work without sound! In the newsfeed, the videos are played silently by Autoplay and often users are in a situation where they can’t – or don’t want to – turn on the sound. So also for the stories: Sound can be used as an additional element, but also without it has to work. If you can’t just tell your story with pictures, use text elements as additional support. Call to actions, polls or other calls to your followers can help you to have them interact with you and strengthen the bond with your brand. In the stories you have the option to add such elements directly and ask your users to express their opinions.

If your Instagram page is visited, so the videos don’t appear in the newsfeed, they won’t play automatically. Therefore, you should choose a suitable thumbnail for each video – one that will make you want to watch the Instagram video and hopefully liken it.

Always keep your image in mind

Also the descriptions of the posts are not to be underestimated! Funny titles, but also the correct use of hashtags can work wonders. You can also use different stickers in the stories – but beware, always think about what fits your image. Specifying time and place can also support your story and tagging users can lead to more interaction. Using emojis, filtering and using features like Boomerang or Rewind can be helpful depending on the message. It is always important to think about what the image is and what message should be conveyed.

Your Instagram videos, whether story or newsfeed, should fulfill three things in any case: work without sound, tell a gripping story and convince in the first seconds!