INSTAGRAM ADS Getting ready for sponsored posts
May 06, 2015
INSTAGRAM ADSGetting ready for sponsored posts
The social media landscape is changing—emerging platforms are maturing
It’s no longer a straight choice between Facebook and Twitter
It’s important for brands to prepare for the launch of new social ad platforms or they may be left behind
WHY?
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Launched in October 2010, Instagram has quickly positioned itself as the leading mobile app for photo and short-form video sharing
Users can edit and add filters to their photos or 15-second videos and share them with friends on the platform or post to other social networks
Facebook acquired Instagram in late 2012 for an eventual $715 million
WHAT IS INSTAGRAM?
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Instagram began testing its ad product, Sponsored Photos and Videos, with brands including Adidas, Burberry, Levi’s, Lexus and Ben & Jerry’s in October 2013
While ads are still a novelty, it appears that the visual nature of Instagram, combined with Facebook’s softly-softly approach to advertising, will pay off
Analysts predict a $340m profit for Instagram in 2014
SPONSORED POSTS
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Instagram is now the stand-out social network when it comes to delivering engagement, according to a recent report by Forrester
In terms of MAUs, even if we use current growth rates to predict size in 2016, Instagram is behind Goole Plus, LinkedIn and Twitter
However, user numbers don’t tell the whole story
HOW BIG IS INSTAGRAM (REALLY)?
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The time users spend there must also be considered, so we have devised a more accurate estimate of the true size of a platform
A platform needs users to be a viable place for advertising, but high user numbers are useless if those users are in and out of the site in a few seconds
Conversely, a highly engaged user base spending hours at a time on a platform is also pointless if the user numbers are low
MAN-HOURS
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Monthly active users
Average monthly time spent on the
platform
X
=Monthly man-hours
spent on the platform
Combining the two figures gives a true reflection of the size of the active user base and time spent on the site
Using man-hours as a guide, we can see that Instagram is actually much more important
MAN-HOURS
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A quadrillion is 1,000 billion, or a one with 15 zeros
Instagram is even more important on mobile, takes second place at 1.3 times the size of Twitter
Facebook is seven times larger than Instagram on mobile, compared to nearly twelve times larger when we include all users
MOBILE MAN-HOURS
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A quadrillion is 1,000 billion, or a one with 15 zeros
The time spent figures are all from a Nielsen report in May 2013, and the active user numbers are the most recent official figures for Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, all after May 2013
In terms of eyeballs and ‘stickiness’, Instagram is the second biggest social network
However, the size of the audience and the time they spend on the platform isn’t the most important factor for marketing
Locating and engaging an audience size that’s of interest to a brand is crucial, as is measuring the influence generated by a brand’s activity on its business goals and KPIs
HOW BIG IS INSTAGRAM?
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USING INSTAGRAM EFFECTIVELY
Advertising on Instagram isn’t like other platforms
All Instagram ads are promoted content
To promote content, brands must have a successful existing Instagram account
If you are thinking about advertising on Instagram, it’s essential to get your account up and running as soon as possible
GETTING STARTED
USING INSTAGRAM EFFECTIVELY
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Share authentic content—make it instantly recognisable as your company’s account, using pictures of both products and logos
There are no clickthroughs on Instagram post or ads so content must engage users within the platform
By adding a call to action, such as instructing followers to include the brand’s username or a branded hashtag in their photos, you can increase user engagement
Develop series of content streams and create a calendar around these streams
CREATING CONTENT
USING INSTAGRAM EFFECTIVELY
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Publish ‘behind the scenes’ images, events and close ups of your products
Some content will be ‘in the moment’ while other images should be planned ahead
Engaging photo descriptions that describe the image and reflect your brand’s message, will increase interactions
Interact with your followers by following, reposting, and commenting on other people’s posts. Interact as a human being –interacting with ten specific photos taken by people in your target market is better than liking random images
CREATING CONTENT
USING INSTAGRAM EFFECTIVELY
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A recent study by TrackMaven of Fortune 500 brands suggested that because Instagram's video service is fairly new, photos perform slightly better for brands versus video
On average, an Instagram video receives up to 24 interactions, compared to 37 for photos. However, Instagram videos can provide two advantages
Brands can distinguish themselves by producing a different mix of pictures and videos
At 15 seconds long and with the capability to upload videos that were not taken with the Instagram app, brands can leverage videos more by creating videos with high production values
CREATING CONTENT
USING INSTAGRAM EFFECTIVELY
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Make sure your content is interesting, attractive, engaging, emotional and memorable
Make content socially discoverable by using multiple relevant hashtags
Data from TrackMaven shows that for bigger brands like Nike and Adidas, between four and 11 hashtags can increase interactions on Instagram to an average of 77 interactions per post
Connect your Instagram account with other social accounts. Many consumers discover branded Instagram posts when they are shared on the company’s other social channels like Facebook, Twitter or Tumblr
CREATING CONTENT
USING INSTAGRAM EFFECTIVELY
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PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
Facebook sees Instagram as its premium ad product with monthly costs reportedly ranging from $350k to close to $1million, so it’s not an option for all
Brands will also need a strong presence on Instagram before signing up for ads, which means users will only see ads that feel right for the platform
Instagram is also vetting the standard of ads, so artwork must be high quality—this ensures that the platform isn’t overloaded with ads
ADVERTISING ON INSTAGRAM
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Brands can convert a standard Instagram post into a sponsored post
The only difference is that the post has a ‘Sponsored’ flag at the top, and it can be targeted to certain users, rather than a brand’s usual followers
Users can also hide any sponsored posts from their feed and submit feedback
THE ADS
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Ads are targeted based on a user’s activity on Instagram (the people they follow and the posts they like) and if a user’s account is linked to Facebook, their Facebook interests and other basic profile information are used
Measurement focuses on reach, ad recall and awareness
Instagram’s ad product is for brand campaigns; there are no clickthroughs here
TARGETING & MEASUREMENT
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Results for initial tests with Ben & Jerry’s, Adidas, Burberry, Levis and Lexus in October 2012:
TEST RESULTS
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Ad Recall:
Across the four campaigns, there was a 32-point incremental lift in ad recall per campaign for people who were repeatedly exposed to a particular campaign versus control groups
Awareness:
Across the four campaigns, there was a ten-point incremental lift in brand message awareness per campaign for people who were repeatedly exposed to a particular campaign versus control groups
In particular, 17 percent of people who saw a single ad for Ben & Jerry’s Scotchy Scotch Scotch-flavoured ice cream not only became aware of the new flavour, they also associated it with the brand
Reach:
All four initial ad campaigns measured were successful at delivering the broad reach our advertisers were seeking
The marketers achieved a high impact with a very low average frequency of ad impressions per user
Levi’s reached 7.4 million people in the U.S. across a nine-day period, targeting people aged 18-34
Ben & Jerry’s reached 9.8 million people in the U.S. over eight days, targeting people aged 18-35
Ben & Jerry’s, it isn’t the biggest brand on Instagram—ranked 90th in terms of followers and use of its hashtag
99% of its non-sponsored posts feature a packshot, and a short witty comment
CASE STUDY: BEN & JERRY’S
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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The same posts are often shared on Facebook and Twitter, interspersed with more aggressive promotional content
Nearly all its Instagram posts record something between 20,000 and 30,000 likes
In terms of organic engagement, Instagram is well ahead of Facebook for Ben & Jerry’s
CASE STUDY: BEN & JERRY’S—ORGANIC CONTENT
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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the Facebook post generated 2,345 likes, 107 shares and 193 comments from a potential audience of 7.4 million Facebook
fans
The Instagram post generated 22,300 likes and
20 comments from a potential audience of
391,000 followers
Creatively, their sponsored content is similar
For this campaign, each ad was only inserted into a user’s feed once, meaning no repetition, a major annoyance on other platforms
On average, each targeted user was exposed to three different ads during the campaign (full case study here)
In an eight-day period they were able to reach 9.8 million users, 25 times their usual reach and 5% of the entire Instagram user base
CASE STUDY: BEN & JERRY’S—SPONSORED CONTENT
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Based on these figures for monthly costs, we can estimate that if this kind of activity costs approximately $600,000 per month, an eight-day run would be around $160,000
A reach of 9.8m users at an average of three impressions is 29.4m exposures, giving us a CPM of $5.44
This might be seen as expensive compared to Facebook’s Q4 2013 CPM of $1.09, and Twitter’s CPM of $3.50 (this figure has been reported for around two years as Twitter doesn’t really work on CPMs), but it’s less than the $7.60 average CPM on YouTube
CASE STUDY: BEN & JERRY’S—ESTIMATED COSTS
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Ranked as the 115th largest brand on Instagram, Levi’s has over 233,000 followers and is growing quickly adding 20,000 followers per month
Levi’s posts are very fashion and product-led, featuring models and jeans
Recent images focus heavily on the cut down jean shorts trend for women and denim shirts and jackets for men
CASE STUDY: LEVI’S
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Messaging is played fairly straight, identifying the products using hashtags
Levi’s has just created a new Facebook page so we can’t compare posts
On Twitter, most of the images posted are the same as on Instagram, with slightly different text
Engagement was much higher on Instagram from an audience half the size
CASE STUDY: LEVI’S—ORGANIC CONTENT
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Instagram generated 4,356 likes from 233,000 followers
Twitter generated 28 retweets and 54 favourites from 458,000 followers
Promoted content follows Levi’s normal style of post—this campaign had more of a theme, featuring outdoor scenes, echoing the kind of images Instagram users would post
The campaign ran over a week in November targeting US adults aged 34 and under
Results were just as impressive as Ben & Jerry’s with the campaign reaching 7.4 million United States consumers and achieving an ad recall lift of 24% versus the control group
CASE STUDY: LEVI’S—SPONSORED CONTENT
PROMOTING CONTENT ON INSTAGRAM
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Julie Channing, Levi's director of digital said, “Not only were we able to reach a large audience with our ads on Instagram, but the metrics clearly show we engaged with them in a memorable and authentic way.”
THE VERDICT
Instagram is growing fast and it has a highly engaged user base
It’s different to Facebook and Twitter—both in the way brands must approach the platform and the way that its users consume branded content
It’s still very early for Instagram ads, but so far, the results look promising
Brands are routinely seeing engagement rates for non-promoted Instagram content that dwarfs the engagement levels seen Facebook and Twitter
It is our strong recommendation that brands set up and develop an Instagram following. Then, when sponsored content becomes available to all, brand’s with an established account will be poised to take advantage.
To discuss how your brand can leverage Instagram, get in touch with TBG.
CONCLUSION
THE VERDICT
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