Are you looking for new ways to get more website visitors? Instagram is a powerful platform that can help you reach new audiences and increase your website traffic.
In this article, we’ll discuss five ways you can use Instagram to get more website visitors!
Tip 1. Use the power of stories
Stories are one of Instagram’s most powerful features, and you can use these to communicate the essence of your website or webshop. Instagram stories are vertical photos or videos that can be viewed for a period of 24 hours by clicking on your profile picture.
The reason people post certain content on their stories rather than their timeline is that some content is less suitable for timelines. Professional content that offers more long-term value can be posted on your timeline. Stories, on the other hand, can be used to share behind the scenes pics, announcements, or quick photos and videos that are disposable after 24 hours.
Some ideas for Instagram stories include:
- Behind the scenes (give your followers a sneak peek of how you work)
- Product announcements (announce new products or blog posts) (TIP: you can use the link function to link to your website)
- Important announcements (announce new features or updates)
- Limited-time discounts and promotions (promote new and existing products)
- Interaction (Q&A, polls, and quizzes)
Instagram highlights
Another key feature related to Instagram stories is the highlights feature, which allows you to highlight certain stories for a longer time. You can use this to highlight stories that add value to your profile.
On Webador’s Instagram, we have the following highlights:
These highlights allow our followers to look at tips and tricks, read reviews, and find out how to get started with Webador.
Your highlights should feature content that’s important to your ideal visitor. Keep in mind that less is more, and select 4-5 highlights so you don’t overwhelm your followers.
Tip 2. Write a clear Instagram bio
Our second tip is to write a clear bio for your Instagram profile. When visitors land on your profile, they immediately want to know two things:
1. What is this website (or webshop) for?
2. What can it offer me?
Within a fraction of a second, visitors who land on your profile have already decided whether they want to continue viewing your profile or go back and keep scrolling. Getting attention on Instagram is very difficult, so simplicity and clarity are important when writing your bio.
On Webador’s profile, we’ve written the following bio:
This clearly tells our followers what we do, how we can help them, and how many customers we’ve already helped with our platform
When you write your bio, make sure to communicate your value clearly and in as few words possible.
Tip 3. Create content that converts
Our third Instagram tip is that it’s important to create content that converts. You’re using Instagram for a reason, because you want to achieve something. Is that…
More website visitors?
More blog readers?
More customers?
Or more orders?
Whatever your goal is, don’t publish Instagram posts without one in mind. The aim is to achieve something with your posts.
When you’ve determined what your goal is, consider how you can direct your Instagram followers to your website.
Study your competitors and look at what types of posts they publish. Ask yourself:
- What’s the purpose of their content? (do they inspire their followers or focus on promoting their website or products)
- How often do they post content? (both stories and timeline posts)
- How do they write their captions? (descriptions of the posts)
The aim of this research isn’t to copy your competition, but to get inspiration and add your own twist.
Once you have an idea of how often you want to post and what your content will focus on, the next step is to write powerful captions.
Start your captions with a good hook. This is usually an attention-grabbing problem or question that makes people want to keep reading.
After the hook, write a few sentences about the topic of your post, and close it with a call to action.
Are you directing your followers to a product? A discount code? A new blog article? Whatever it is, close with a call to action so your followers take action.
Tip 4. Use the right hashtags for more reach
You can be found online more quickly via Google and YouTube than on Instagram. This is because the first two are search engines, while Instagram is not.
You can greatly increase your reach on Instagram by adding 10-15 hashtags to every post. These hashtags are the “keywords” your target audience can use to find your post (and also your profile!).
How does this work?
People that follow certain hashtags will see your posts, or they might type in a hashtag and see it that way.
When selecting hashtags to use, make sure you choose ones that have both a small and large search volume. One mistake a lot of people make is only using hashtags with big search volumes, while doing this means your post is more likely to disappear among all the others.
By using hashtags with a smaller search volume (between 10,000 and 1,000,000 but with a big emphasis on the lower end of that scale), you can be found much more easily. You can see a hashtag’s search volume when you type it into the search bar on Instagram.
Tip 5. Give shoutouts within your community
Our fifth Instagram tip is to make use of the community building tools available.
If there’s one reason to use this social media platform, it’s the sheer number of features that help build a community.
As a website owner, building your own community is one of your most important tasks. When you launch a new product or publish a new blog post, you can promote it directly to your community.
Here are some tips for community building:
#1. Quizzes
As quiz questions in your stories, for example questions about your products, articles, or company.
#2. Polls
Let your audience vote on topics, e.g. which blog post they’d like to see published or which products they’d like to see launched in future
#3. Questions
Ask your community questions about why they like using your website or products. You can then highlight answers in your stories.
Why is this kind of interaction important?
Engaging with your audience like this tells the Instagram algorithm that other users interact a lot with your profile, which increases the chances of your posts and stories being more visible more quickly.
Pro tip: Encourage your followers to contact you via Instagram DM, as this makes it easier to interact directly with your ideal visitor or customer.
Conclusion
Instagram is a great platform that provides different ways for you to increase your website traffic and build a community. By writing a clear bio, using Instagram stories, creating content that converts, using the right hashtags, and sharing shoutouts within your community, you can quickly gain more website visitors.
We also recommend checking out this article, where we explain how you can increase your website’s rank in Google search results.
Do you want to build your own website or launch a webshop? With Webador’s intuitive website builder, you can get your business online today.
I agree with these tips.