Instagram is big business, especially if you run a business or you’re looking to become an influencer. There’s so much more to the platform than just simply sharing an image these days. For businesses, there’s now a need to create a whole strategy, monitor growth and conversions and to attract big business from this social platform alone. To begin, you need an Instagram Business Account.
How to change to an Instagram Business Account in 4 easy steps
Not sure why you need an Instagram Business Account?
It’s simple. It allows you to do more than a regular account. If you’re running a business you’ll want to be tracking the performance of your marketing efforts and Instagram is a marketing tool! Growthoid is a great tool for marketing.
Business Accounts allow you to see demographics about your followers such as their ages, locations and sex. What it also allows you to do is discover the most active times and dates when your followers are on Instagram. Which in short will help you post at the best times to gain the highest engagement possible, which helps you to be seen by more potential customers.
Be found by more customers
Are you a service-based business looking for more bookings? Instagram Business Accounts not only allow you to add an email address, phone number and location address, they now allow you to link up your booking programme to drive direct bookings. Making it easier for you as a business to convert followers (or those looking at your Instagram) into paying customers.
Not content with just this information, Instagram Business Accounts also allow you to look into the top-performing content that you post in terms of the number of a specific action it receives including;
- Calls
- Comments
- Emails
- Engagement
- Follows
- Get Directions
- Impressions
- Likes
- Profile Visits
- Reach
- Saved
- Shares
- Texts
- Website Clicks
This helps you to create more engaging content with purpose moving forward.
We discuss this and more in our ‘Starter Strategy for the ‘gram’ 30-day programme and how to create a basic marketing strategy for your business’ Instagram. You can buy it directly below or click on the cover to discover more about the 30-day programme.
Creating a Business Account
It’s really simple to create an Instagram Business Account and you can convert your current Instagram to a business ‘gram if you already have one. Just make sure that it’s not a personal account. Keep your business social channels separate to your personal accounts, unless you’re an Influencer and then that’s different again.
1 – Make sure you have the Instagram app downloaded to your smartphone
2 – Create an account in one of two ways:
- Option 1: Sign up with your email address or phone number, and then enter a username.
- Option 2: If you have a Facebook account, you can log in with the same information and link the accounts.
- If you already have an account, just sign in, and go straight to your profile page.
3 – Connect to Facebook
- You have to connect your account to a Facebook business page in order to create a Business Account. Click on the profile icon at the bottom right of the screen.
- At the top right corner of the page, open the settings menu. It appears as a vertical ellipsis in Android or a gear in iOS.
- On the following page, scroll down until you see “Switch to a business profile.” Click through the promo slideshow until you get a prompt to connect to Facebook. Select “Choose a page,” and set the page to “public.” Click “OK.”
- Next, Instagram will ask for permission to manage your Facebook pages. Look through the list of Facebook business pages you’ve already created. Select the page you want to connect and click “Next.” – only an admin on the Facebook Business Page can complete this step. You won’t see the page if you’re just an authorised user.
4) Complete Setup
- Complete your profile, enter an email, phone number, and address for your business. You must fill in at least one of these contact fields to proceed. Some information will be auto-filled if it already appears on your Facebook page.
- Click “Done,” and go to your profile. A new graph icon should appear at the top of the Instagram app. This is your Insights page, where you can keep track of promotions and engagement stats.
At any time, you can go back to the profile page and switch back to a personal account, however, this isn’t something that as a business owner we would recommend.
Looking for more Instagram tips? You might want to check out the following posts;- HOW TO WRITE THE PERFECT INSTAGRAM BIO FOR YOUR BRAND
Getting Verified on Instagram
Businesses can now request a blue tick on Instagram, this means that they’re verified as a legitimate business. It’s simple to request, however, do note that not all verifications are successful. You can re-request every 30 days.
- Click on ‘Settings’ – the little gear icon
- Then click on ‘Account’
- Followed by ‘Request Verification’
- Complete the form and submit. Wait and hear back from Instagram with hopefully a blue verified tick.
If that’s not detailed enough our Business Growth Club shows you how to build a fool-proof Instagram Strategy, convert your followers into an army of paying customers, create content that goes viral, and write copy that kills just for starters.
We’d also love you to share this post with anybody you think might benefit from reading it. Perhaps onto Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest?
