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7 Instagram Marketing Trends for 2021
You Need to Watch

There are more than 1 billion daily Instagram users out of which over 80% follow at least one business account. If your business is on Instagram, there are high chances that your profile can be one of the most visited profiles on this social media platform.

Instagram is the top photo and video sharing app and 79% of the US population uses it daily. Millions of companies and businesses use Instagram to generate revenue and increase engagement, which is the highest among all the social media platforms. To increase engagement on Instagram, you can apply several organic marketing strategies or buy real and active Instagram followers for a start.

Instagram marketing trends are changing with time and it is important to stay updated to get the most out of the platform. In this article, we are going to tell you 7 Instagram marketing trends for 2021 to stay ahead of your competitors.

1. Instagram stories

Since then, the Instagram Stories feature was launched in August 2016 and has become incredibly popular among Instagram influencers and brands. According to Meltwater, 86.6% of users on Instagram post stories, and over 80% of brands say that this feature has made a huge impact on their influencer marketing.

But to gain the most benefit from Instagram stories, you need to have a strategy for it too. We recommend using functions like polls, stickers, emoji sliders, Q/As, etc., to increase engagement on instagram. If you have more than 10K followers, you would surely want to use the Swipe Up feature that takes the users to the target site or profile. You can add your social media links, website link, youtube video link to it.

If your stories have good content, then users are more likely to engage with you and follow your profile and most probably visit your website too.

2. Instagram Reels

Instagram Reels came into existence after being inspired by TikTok in August 2020. It allows users to create and edit short videos of up to 30 seconds. As Instagram marketing is more popular than TikTok, brands can use reels to increase their engagement and gain more leads. It is a great option to gain benefit from TikTok style content, challenges, trends, etc., without moving to another platform and building an audience again.

Several brands are already using Instagram reels in their promotion campaigns. Any kind of content can be added to them that can engage the maximum audience. First of all, reels acquire full screen in a user’s mobile phone, secondly, a user needs to watch it from the beginning if some part gets skipped. Also, when someone shares a reel on their Instagram story, the reel gets played there too, and most of the time users open that reel to watch it whole. Now you see, Reels have become an important Instagram marketing trend in no time.

3. Shopping features and product tagging

The growth of internet shopping is insane and is only increasing day by day. More and more people are turning to the internet to buying everything from clothing to food to cars. Since more than 70% of shoppers use Instagram to find new products, it is obvious that Instagram is making it easier for them to shop without even leaving the platform. These shopping features make it convenient for marketers who want to use Instagram as a marketing tool and an e-commerce channel.

This feature allows marketers to put a shopping bag icon on the product and service they are providing. By clicking on that bag option, users can view product prices, information and redirect to the brand’s website to buy the product.

This is one of the best marketing features Instagram has introduced that has helped marketers maintain professionalism and expertise on the platform.

4. Influencer marketing with nano-influencers

Nano-influencers are a social media marketers’ secret weapon. They have a comparatively smaller following of around 5,000 but have a better engagement with their target audience. The reason behind more engagement of the nano-influencers is the small community that they have built by reaching their audience through hard work.

Influencer marketing has become mainstream nowadays and most brands consider it one of the best ways to reach out to their target audience. According to a Nielsen report, 92% of users trust recommendations from individuals/influencers (even if they don’t know them) more than brands’ claims. Using people who are reputable, trustworthy, and likable is a great strategy to market your brand.

5. Focus on IGTV

Though Instagram Live and Instagram Reel content are trending, IGTV hasn’t lost its importance. Instagram IGTV is its long-form video platform. In the initial days of Instagram marketing, markets had to turn towards YouTube to upload lengthy videos and do its promotion separately. But now Instagram has made it simpler, they can upload long videos on IGTV without moving on to any other platform.

To make IGTV even more beneficial for marketers, Instagram has announced that they will allow ads on the platform. This will let IGTV content creators get the same ad revenue % as YouTube creators. More features will be added to this component of Instagram in the future.

6. Trending cross-platform content

While all social media platforms tend to favor native content, you can find content from another platform trending somewhere else. It is like a mixture of native and cross-platform content. Among all social media platforms, Instagram is #1 to bring trends to other platforms so that users do not need to try any other platform and use Instagram more. For instance, Reels as an alternative to TikTok videos, IGTV to YouTube videos, GIFs, stickers, face filters, etc.

Using these cross-platform content options that Instagram offers can be highly beneficial for your brand and you should definitely involve them in your Instagram marketing strategy.

7. Branded AR Effects

Snapchat introduced the trend of branded effects and it surely became ridiculously popular. Facebook took that idea and turned it into an entire platform. Facebook's Spark AR Studio went public in 2019 and since then over 1 billion people have used it to create their own AR effect filters around the world.

Branded AR effects are used by brands across industries. Cosmetic companies allow users to try on different makeup products virtually. Clothing and home decor brands launch certain AR effects that let users try an outfit or how a specific decor would look in their space. This is an excellent way for brands to market their products to users who are keenly interested to shop online.

Conclusion

So, these were some amazing Instagram marketing trends that you should definitely try while promoting your brand. We hope you get lots of engagement and success on the platform.