Instagram is a social media platform that resonates well with both video and image content, this makes it one of the best platforms to promote your e-commerce business.
According to Statista, Instagram has over 1 billion active users and 500 million of them use the platform daily. Therefore, if you have an e-commerce store, then using video to promote your products and services on Instagram should be a top priority.
In this blog post, I am going to show you how you can use different types of Instagram videos to promote your e-commerce business.
Why You Should Use Instagram Videos for Your E-commerce Store
According to Instagram Head, Adam Mosseri “Video is driving an immense amount of growth online for all the major platforms right now, and it’s one that we think we need to lean into more.” He also tweeted in June 2021 saying that changes are coming to videos on Instagram.
Furthermore, 80% of video marketers say video has increased their sales, while 84% of customers say they bought goods or services after watching a video.
In fact, 85% of businesses are actively using video as a marketing tool and over 72% of customers prefer to learn about goods and services via videos.
If you think about it, Instagram feeds are always flooded with videos, and considering how close to 90% of people on Instagram follow a business, video content is something you can’t afford to ignore.
Table of Content
What Is Instagram Video Marketing?
Types of videos you can post on Instagram
Benefits of Using Instagram Videos for your E-commerce Business
Tools to create Instagram Videos
We have been talking about how important it is for you to incorporate Instagram videos to improve your e-commerce business. What then is Instagram video Marketing?
What Is Instagram Video Marketing?
Instagram video marketing is a form of marketing where a business, organization, brand, or individual uses video content to promote their products and services. Video marketing on Instagram can help businesses drive sales and engagement at a very affordable rate depending on the business objectives.
On Instagram, you can use various features to publish high and engaging videos that are sure to grab the audience’s attention. There is a good chance that your video marketing effort on Instagram will prove more successful and cost-effective than the normal traditional means of video marketing.
Types of Videos You can Post on Instagram
1. In-Feed Instagram Videos
These are regular Instagram videos that appear in your feed. They are similar to in-feed videos on Facebook and Twitter. They are videos that can be up to 60 seconds long and have an aspect ratio limit of 4:5. The audience has the ability to like and comment on this kind of video. The more people like and comment on your videos, the more it stays at the top of the feed.
The in-feed videos are automatically played without sound. In a situation where the user has turned off the autoplay feature on Instagram, there is still a chance to have them view your video if there is a thumbnail displayed with the play button for them to click. You can even create a carousel of videos or pictures, including up to ten at a time.
How to Use In-Feed Instagram Videos to Promote Your E-commerce Business
As an e-commerce business owner, you should try these tips to get the best results from your video campaigns;
- Use related caption
- Keep your video short and engaging
- Attractive thumbnails
- Label products
- Create a storyline
- Use subtitles
When using video marketing in feeds, you need to create a storyline (an opportunity to show content behind the scenes to appeal to your audience’s emotion which can increase chances of buying). Create product videos that resonate with your store’s products and tag the products using the shoppable posts feature.
Make your videos short and engaging. Use attractive thumbnails in case the user has turned off the autoplay function. This way the user can still click on the thumbnail and see the video. You can add a thumbnail by adding the title of the video as overlay text.
Also, use subtitles because about 83% of people watch videos with the sound turned off. Therefore if you have a message you want your audience to know, you should use captions on your videos.
2. Instagram Video Stories
Over 500 million users utilize Instagram stories on a daily basis. And what is more amazing is that over one-third of the most viewed stories are published by businesses.
To effectively leverage Instagram stories for your e-commerce business, your Instagram video stories need to have a resolution of 9:16. Each Instagram story video can only be a maximum of 15 seconds long with a recommended size of 1020 pixels by 1920 pixels. Note that there is no limit on the number of slides your story can have which is a great way to publish really long videos. You can create multiple stories and send them as one.
Furthermore, these videos will be visible to your audience for 24 hours. You also have a chance of saving them and displaying them as highlights on your profile.
How to Leverage Instagram Stories for Your E-commerce Business
Use stickers
With Instagram, you can embed stickers in your stories. As an e-commerce business, you should leverage the question, polls, product, and timer stickers to improve your videos.
You can use question and poll stickers to know more about what type of content your audience engages most with on Instagram.
Add links
This feature is important when you have large followership. You can share links of products in your Instagram stories which takes your customers to a landing page of that particular product.
Use hashtags
Make use of the most relevant hashtag. Hashtags can push your stories to a wider audience. All you have to do is find the most relevant hashtag and add them to your Instagram stories. You can add up to 10 hashtags and if your story gets a lot of attention, the hashtags will help them rank on the explore page.
3. Instagram Video Advertising
Instagram video ads are another type of Instagram video campaign you can use to promote your e-commerce business. This can give you quicker results than using in-feed video. You can create both in-feed video ads and story ads. And if used effectively, it can generate more clicks and conversions than photo ads.
In-feed video ads can be up to 120 seconds long, although you can add up to 10 slides if you are creating carousel ads which should not be more than 60 seconds per video. Story ads on the other hand can be up to 15 seconds long with a maximum of three slides.
Instagram supports a 1:1 resolution for in-feed ads and a resolution of 9:16 for story ads for mobile optimization.
How to Leverage Instagram Video Advertising for Your E-commerce Business
Use thumbnails to make up for autoplay turnoff
Many users might turn off the autoplay functions on their Instagram. Therefore, you need to use thumbnails to convince people who have turned off the autoplay function to view your ads.
The strategy here is to reduce the amount of text you use to less than 20%. If you exceed this, Instagram will reduce the reach of your ads and you have to pay more to run your ads.
Make your videos short
According to Facebook, the shorter your videos, the more people are likely to engage with them. An experiment carried out by Facebook on Instagram showed some video ads were 6, 15, and 30 seconds long. It was deduced that those videos that were 6 seconds long drove the best results.
Meaning as the length of the video increases the watch time decreases. Therefore, you have to create short ads that get to the point quickly and let your product landing page provide the rest of the information.
Use simple language that your audience can understand
Make sure you use simple language to explain your services and products in your ad video. This way, people are able to understand the message you are trying to pass across. The shorter and simpler your video is, the more people will interact with it.
Optimize videos for mobile consumption
It is better to optimize your videos for mobile consumption because not all functions of Instagram are available on the desktop. The number of smartphone users is increasing daily. Therefore your videos must be optimized for all devices like tablets, mobiles, and desktops.
Benefits of Using Instagram Videos for Your E-commerce Business
1. Video works well with E-commerce
Visual content is one of the most engaging content in the field of digital marketing. And while photos work great for most brands on Instagram, videos are a great way for you to share more information about your product and services.
Here are some types of videos that work well with e-commerce on Instagram
How to’s and tutorials.
There is a need to build a bond with your Instagram followers. Social media is not just about having large followers, it is about having followers that engage with your post. Nurturing your followers to your product can help you build that bond. This way they will feel more inclined towards purchasing your products.
How-to videos are the best types of content for teaching and nurturing your Instagram followers. You can create how-to videos of your products, on how they can use your product and services.
Short videos will do just fine for in-feed posts while creating longer videos for Instagram stories. This is because you can create an unlimited number of slides to your carousel stories.
Product videos.
You can also create videos that show your audience how to use your product. How your product can be of benefit to them. Use a combination of stories and in-feed posts and find out which ones drive the most sales. Ensure you tag products to make it easy for followers to find your product in your marketing video.
If a video generates a lot of engagement, you can replicate the format and leverage ads and influencer marketing to propagate the results. Make sure you work with influencers who are interested in your industry and have large and engaging followers to share links to your products in their stories.
Brand storytelling.
Brand storytelling is a narrative you create with the facts and emotions around your brand to connect with your followers and customers on a deeper and more relatable level.
For example, you can create a short video on how your company came to be or you can create a short video on how you became known for the service you offer. If your story can affect a lot of people emotionally, they will begin to feel empathy for your brand and want to buy your products. This video works best on your story highlights as people get to see them when they visit your Instagram page to learn more about you.
Behind-the-scenes videos.
Behind-the-scenes videos are more like brand storytelling as they bring people closer to your company. You can create videos of your employees working, or videos of your office and some of the tools you use to work, videos of your company at an event will also resonate with your audience.
This can be shared as stories, highlights, and in-feed videos. But highlights will prove more effective as people will see them more clearly when they view your bio.
Live Instagram Video
Instagram live allows you to stream live videos to your followers. Here, you are able to communicate with your audience in real-time to deepen customer relationships.
Note that Instagram live videos are often spontaneous and unsolicited. They are often not as professional and edited like feed videos. Instead, it is about real connection and authenticity.
2. Use Real-time Marketing Insight
Instagram can help your business gather a lot of insightful data and information from their insight page and other third parties analytic tools like Google and Semrush. This data can be used to study customer behavior which is used not only to improve your marketing but also your products. You can gather first-hand information about your product and services from your followers by using the questions and polls stickers for stories.
3. Keep your Business in the Face of Your Customers.
If you are able to execute your Instagram video marketing strategy effectively, you will build a strong brand presence that will keep on ringing in the mind of your customers. They will choose you over your competitors when they are ready to buy.
4. It will Increase Engagement and Sales
Utilizing Instagram videos for your e-commerce business can help you generate more engagement and ultimately generate more sales for your business.
Make your videos engaging, informative, and entertaining at the same time. Add relevant hashtags, create attractive thumbnails, and subtitles to make them meaningful and appealing to your audience. So, the more video content you publish, the more engagement you stand to gain.
Tools to Create Instagram Videos
1. VivaVideo
VivaVideo is a video editing app you can use to personalize, style, and publish video content. It also has different tools you can use to merge, trim, reverse, and split videos. It also comes with several options for filters, music, texts, transitions, themes, and stickers. It has a storyboard style wherein a user can load, edit, and trim clips.
2. Inshot
Inshot is a video creation and editing app that allows users to create high-quality, 360-degree videos with their phones to share on social media, particularly Instagram and Facebook.
With Inshot you can perform the following editing features :
- Video splitting
- Video trimming
- Merging video clips
- Importing photos or images
- Applying various filter effects
- Adding music or sound effects
- Adding voice-over effects
- Adding animations, stickers, or text to videos
3. Filmora
Filmora is another video creation and editing software that comes with different styles, effects, and customization. It has a layer that allows for multiple video clips, GIF support, noise removal, Audio mixer, Screen Recording, and Audio separation. You can use its awesome text editing for your subtitles. Other features of Filmora include split screen, video stabilization, audio equalizer, and 4K resolution editing support.
4. Moovly
Moovly is an app that can create promo videos, explainer videos, training videos, and tutorials easily with their customizable templates. It also comes with sounds and images with subtitle options along with a friendly mobile user app. You also have the option of video automation, custom color, and color removal.
5. Canva
Canva is another tool that makes creating graphics, static images, and videos really easy. You can use the free tool for creating videos in different dimensions and use its extensive library of templates, elements, animations, and effects to create videos.
Conclusion
Instagram is still one of the best platforms to promote your e-commerce business because it supports visual content like images and videos. While offering features like shoppable posts that make it easy to sell more. Instagram checkout has also made it possible for facilitating the full purchase process directly within the app.
Therefore, if you want to increase your sales, focus more on your Instagram video marketing to generate engagement that leads to purchase.
Although video content might take some effort, the potential return on investment(ROI) is worth it
