Getting The Best From Instagram Analytics and The Different Types Of Instagram Ads

Do you really know what is going on with your Instagram account? We are not just talking about Instagram Ads here but your overall marketing performance with the platform. The good news is that you can learn a great deal about how things are working out for you with Instagram Analytics.

A lot of businesses that use Instagram don’t really know what is going on with their accounts. You need to know how many views your Instagram Ads are getting as well as how well your stories and conventional posts are doing.

Problems that you could have with your Instagram Account

If you are running your Instagram account blind and don’t know what is really going on then you could have all kinds of issues that you could do something about. One of the biggest issues you could face is targeting the wrong audience. You are not going to get optimum results from your Instagram Ads if you target the wrong people.

How about your posting frequency? Are you making too many posts or not enough? With your Instagram Ads are you driving the right visitors to your website? If the ad is driving the right kind of visitors from Instagram are you using this ad enough to get more good traffic?

Getting the most from your Instagram Ads and conventional posts is all about engagement. So do you know how well you are doing from an engagement point of view? You need to know the number of comments, shares and likes that your posts are receiving.

There are more things that you need to know when using an Instagram account for marketing. By taking a look at your Instagram metrics you will discover what is working and what isn’t and then you can take the appropriate action.

Important Areas To Check with Instagram Analytics

There is a vast amount of information available to you from Instagram Analytics and it can be quite overwhelming if you are new to it. So to help you we have identified the most important areas that you should focus on as a minimum.

Audience Analytics

If you don’t get your target audience right then you will never get the results that you want. You can find out a great deal of information in Instagram Analytics about your audience. Here is what we recommend you take a look at:

• Best locations – here you can see the top 5 locations where your followers live

• Age ranges – what is the age range of your followers? Within Analytics Instagram breaks age ranges down by 13 to 17, 18 to 24, 25 to 34, 35 to 44, 45 to 54, 55 to 64 and 65 and over.

• Gender – here you can see how many of your followers are male or female

• Follower hours – with this you can see the average time of day your followers are logged on

• Follower days – the days of the week your followers are active

Post Analytics

You can see the following about your posts:

• Interactions – what did users do e.g. visit your profile, visit your website etc

• Discovery – are users finding your content using the Discovery feature?

• Follows – the number of new followers you get from a post

• Reach – unique users that the post reached

• Impressions – views to your posts

• Comments – how many comments on your posts

Stories Analytics

You can use Analytics to see how your stories are doing:

• Impressions – number of views to your stories

• Reach – unique users that viewed your stories

• Exits – number of exits from your stories

• Replies – the number of relies to an element of your stories

Types Of Instagram Ads

More and more businesses are turning to Instagram for their advertising these days. Not only does Instagram have a very large user base but it is also the social platform with the highest level of engagement. Instagram have made it easier for businesses by offering a number of different types of ad:

Instagram Photo Ads

Photo ads are the most common type of ad on Instagram. This is not surprising as sharing photos and images is the most popular thing to do on the platform. A number of business are taking advantage of photo ads to promote their brands, their products and services, their upcoming launches and events and a great deal more.

When you use a photo ad the image must be relevant to whatever you are promoting. You can add a compelling caption to your photo to persuade users to take the action that you want. Use the right hashtags in the caption and you will extend the reach of your ad. Many large and small brands use a lot of photo ads for their campaigns.

Post Boosting or Sponsored Ads

If you have a business account on Instagram then you can boost posts that you have already made to extend the reach of the posts. Boosted ads will appear in the home feed of their target audience and they can contain a direct website link, an online store or the user’s profile page.

Some businesses use sponsored ads to promote giveaways and contests. They do this to increase the amount of participation that the original post achieved. This can be very successful with increasing engagement levels too.

Instagram Story Ads

Stories are very popular on Instagram and around 80% of the active users post a story at least twice a week. You can generate a great deal of traffic through stories as they are popular with Instagram users.

When you create a story ad it will usually appear when an Instagram user is switching between one story and another. You can add a direct link to your website from a story ad or a link to your profile. Stories will only appear for a few seconds and once they are gone that is it. They are still a good ad choice though.

Instagram Video Ads

Video is an immensely popular choice of media with social users and this is certainly the case on Instagram. The view rate for videos is much higher than it is for other media types. You can post a 30 to 60 second video ad and these can be full ads or teasers.

If you create the right kind of videos then video ads will probably bring you a lot of success. You can get some really high viewing numbers with the right video ad and you can add direct links and a call to action in the caption.

Instagram Carousel Ads

If you want to showcase a number of different products in your ad then you need to go for a carousel ad. Instagram users are used to swiping through a number of different images in a carousel and this usually means higher engagement levels.

As with the other type of ads you can add a captivating caption with a call to action and a direct link back to your website, store or profile. So use carousel ads when you want to get the word out about a range of your products.