How to Lower the Cost of Advertising on Instagram
Instagram has so much potential when it comes to advertising, so it’s crazy that companies aren’t taking advantage of it. Apart from the fact that it boasts a huge audience that only keeps on growing, it has the highest engagement rate out of all other platforms, it has very powerful targeting features, and you are able to set your budget for it. That being said, many are afraid to begin working with it because they think that it will eat up their entire budget without much to show for it in return, which is actually assumed of all paid social media advertising platforms. However, it doesn’t have to be if you do it right. In addition, as we mentioned earlier, there’s no way that all of your money will be eaten up because you’re the one who sets the price. The beauty of advertising on Instagram is the whole process that goes into getting your ad live. It’s actually an auction, therefore, should you win, you most likely won’t even have to pay the price that you bid and instead, only have to pay the lowest bid price necessary in order to win. Therefore, to give you an idea, let’s take a look at the Instagram advertising pricing in 2017.
The CPM, or cost per thousand impressions, was around $13.92. The average CPC, or cost-per-click was $1.94. Keep in mind, though, that these are merely averages. The price is actually impacted immensely by a number of factors such as the industry that you’re in and the demographics that you’re targeting. In addition, you also want to make sure that you keep your relevancy score high. This is yet another factor that impacts the price. The fresher and more relevant your ad content is, the higher your score and thus, the lower your price. Therefore, if your content isn’t relevant or quality, your score will be low, which increases your price.
Another factor that stops people from creating Instagram ad campaigns is the fact that they don’t even know where to get started as it’s unknown territory. However, we’re here to not only tell you that it’s really not that difficult but also to let you know how to do it. Therefore, keep reading to find out.
How to Advertise on Instagram
If you weren’t aware, Instagram’s parent company is actually Facebook. This means that all of the magic happens there. Therefore, begin by linking your Instagram account to your Facebook business account. Only then, are you able to access the Ads Manager. As soon as you enter, the first thing that’s asked of you is to establish your objective. They really help you meet your goals whether you’re trying to drive awareness of your company item, app or service, get potential customers to learn more about your items or services, boost item sales, mobile app downloads, or get even more visitors to your store. Depending on your objective, select one of the following: boost your posts, promote your page, send people to your website, increase conversions on your website, get installs of your app, increase engagement in your app, reach people near your business, raise attendance at your event, get people to claim your offer, or get video views.
Next, you need to set up your target audience. Instagram makes it easy for you to reach those who matter the most to you with the help of their precise targeting options. You can target by location, demographics, interests, and behaviors to name a few. Therefore, through automated targeting, they are able to quickly create an audience that may be interested in your company. In addition, you are able to create custom audiences, which are compiled of customers that you’ve already interacted with, therefore, you already have information such as their email addresses or phone numbers. On top of that, you are able to create lookalike audiences, which are groups of people that are very similar to your current, most valuable customer base. Be sure that once you’ve made your selection, you’ve taken a look at the gauge to see whether or not your audience is narrow enough.
Afterward, it’s time for you to set both your budget and your schedule. You’re able to choose from one of two types of budgets. The daily one is the amount you can spend on a daily basis on a specific ad while your lifetime budget is the amount that you can spend during the lifetime of an ad. Then, set your schedule to either go live starting that day, or you can set your own start and end date. In addition, you are able to set your optimization for ad delivery that way you can have an influence on who ends up seeing your ads. Those three options include link clicks, impressions, and daily unique reach. Only then are you able to set your bid amount. You can select either manual or automatic, but since you’re just starting, it’s best to select automatic.
The next section is all about your ad creative. The great part about advertising on Instagram is the fact that your ad won’t be annoying as it’ll go seamlessly into the rest of the platform. In fact, it looks no different than all of the other posts. You can choose between photo ads, video ads, carousel ads, and stories ads. Regardless of the one that you select, be sure that you know the size and quality specifics that way your visual looks good. In this section, you also focus on creating the caption for it. Remember that less means more. Also, don’t be afraid to throw in some hashtags as they actually work wonders. In addition, to neglect to select a CTA, or call-to-action button.
At this point, all you need to do is place the order. However, your work isn’t done yet. When the ad goes live, we can’t stress enough how important it is to track how your ad performs. You may need to invest in a solution such as our own if you don’t want bots clicking on your ads and if you want to see what users are doing outside of the platform. TEA, which stands for threat and engagement analytics, does exactly that. If you would like to know more, head on over to our site where you can find a free webinar.