You’re investing in paid search, display ads on Google, and advertising across Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and even specialized industry platforms. You might even be exploring guerilla marketing tactics or NPR commercials. Yet, you’re hesitant about Instagram, unsure if it can deliver a return on investment. Let me tell you, dismissing Instagram today would be a mistake! While Instagram might be newer and have a smaller user base compared to its parent company Facebook, it’s the rising star everyone wants to be associated with. Instagram offers a space to share visual narratives through diverse ad formats, and many advertisers have found this channel generates a higher ROI than their other advertising efforts. Today, Instagram boasts 800 million active users, according to Statista, and its growth since 2013 has been remarkable. Take a look at the graph below.

But with such a massive active user base constantly scrolling through their feeds, how can a business like yours stand out? This is where Instagram advertising comes in. Similar to Facebook, popularity breeds clutter, and organically breaking through that noise to make a real impact can feel impossible. Instagram ads are your solution, allowing you to target the right audience, at the right time, with the right message and visuals. This guide will equip you with everything you need to know to launch your own Instagram advertising campaign. «Short on time? Grab our free All-Star Playbook to Online Advertising for later.»

What Exactly Is Instagram Advertising?

Instagram advertising involves paying to feature sponsored content on the platform to connect with a wider and more targeted audience. While businesses and individuals might choose to advertise for various reasons, Instagram advertising is commonly used to enhance brand visibility, drive website traffic, acquire new leads, and guide existing leads further down the sales funnel (hopefully towards conversion). Being a visually-driven platform, text ads are non-existent on Instagram. You’ll need an image, a collection of images, or a video (which can be paired with text) to connect with your audience. The best part? Instagram advertising gets results! As of March 2017, over 120 million Instagrammers visited a website, sought directions, made calls, sent emails, or directly messaged businesses to learn more after seeing an Instagram ad. According to Instagram, 60% of users discover new products on the platform, and 75% take action after finding inspiration in a post. Similar to Facebook ads, putting some financial backing behind your post will increase brand exposure and give you greater control over who sees it.

For more interesting facts about Instagram, check out this post.

Is Instagram Advertising a Good Fit for Your Business?

This brings us to a crucial question: Who uses Instagram? Is it just teenagers snapping selfies or twenty-somethings looking for recipes? What about older generations? Are they sharing pictures of their grandchildren? While there’s certainly content featuring grandchildren, Instagram does lean towards a younger demographic. The largest user group falls between the ages of 18-29 (55%), followed by 30-49 year-olds (28%). Only 11% are aged 50-64, and a mere 4% are 65+. According to Hootsuite, the majority of Instagram users (32%) reside in urban areas, with 28% in the suburbs and 18% in rural areas. While there are more women on Instagram than men, the gender gap isn’t as wide as it once was. If this doesn’t perfectly align with your target audience, don’t write off Instagram just yet. Similar to Facebook’s trajectory, more adults over 34 are likely to join as the platform continues to expand. And if you’re targeting that 4% of adults over 65, you can directly target them…

Via Jenn’s Trends Much like other social advertising platforms, Instagram empowers you with granular control to target specific genders, age groups, locations, interests, behaviors, and more. You can even target custom or lookalike audiences, ensuring your ads are seen by your direct leads or those who share similar characteristics. What truly sets Instagram apart is its use of Facebook’s demographic data to display ads to the right people. This makes it incredibly valuable for businesses aiming at niche audiences, leveraging Facebook’s extensive history and detailed targeting capabilities.

Instagram advertising is particularly potent for businesses in visual or creative industries, such as restaurants or craft businesses.

What About the Cost of Instagram Ads?

Providing an exact cost is tricky, as it’s influenced by several factors, some of which the platform keeps under wraps. The model is rooted in CPC (cost-per-click) and CPM (cost-per-impression), with prices determined by Instagram’s ad auction. **“**The cost of Instagram ads hinges on numerous factors - from your audience to ad feedback," says Andrew Tate from AdEspresso. “There’s a lot to consider when understanding Instagram advertising.” AdEspresso’s analysis of $100 million worth of Instagram ad spend in 2017 revealed that the average CPC for Instagram ads in Q3 fell between $0.70 and $0.80. While this serves as a useful benchmark, remember that the actual cost fluctuates based on the auction, audience, competition, time of day, day of the week, and more.

Some advertisers have observed higher engagement rates with Instagram ads, but this comes at a price. Keith Baumwald, founder of Leverag Consulting, notes that Instagram ad costs tend to be slightly higher than Facebook’s. He suggests that due to the highly targeted nature of these ads, CPMs can reach as high as $5. The silver lining is that advertisers retain control over budget allocation. You can opt for a daily budget to cap daily spending or a lifetime budget, where your ads run until the designated budget is exhausted. Other methods to manage Instagram ad spend include setting an ad schedule (specifying the hours you want your ads displayed), choosing your ad delivery method (link clicks, impressions, or daily unique reach), and setting your bid amount (manual or automatic).

6 Simple Steps to Launch Your Instagram Advertising Campaign

Mastering a new advertising platform might seem daunting at first. Fortunately, if you’re already advertising on Facebook, the learning curve is minimal. Instagram ads can be configured directly through Facebook Ad Manager. Don’t worry if you haven’t ventured into Facebook advertising. We’ll guide you through the process below, and there’s always the option to create basic ads directly within the Instagram app. Experienced advertisers or those managing larger ad sets can utilize Power Editor or Facebook’s Marketing API for ad configuration. Instagram Partners is another avenue for businesses handling multiple ad campaigns, managing substantial communities, and delivering content at scale. This post will focus on ad creation through Facebook Ad Manager, the most common method due to its user-friendliness and superior customization options compared to the app. While configuring Instagram ads isn’t overly complicated, there are several steps to be aware of, starting with…

1. Accessing Facebook’s Ad Manager

To access Ad Manager within Facebook, simply follow this link, provided you’re logged into the correct Facebook account. Note: Instagram doesn’t have a dedicated Ad Manager; Instagram ads are managed through the Facebook Ads interface.

2. Defining Your Marketing Objective

Now for the exciting part – choosing your campaign goal. The goals are self-explanatory. Need more traffic? Select the traffic goal. Aiming to boost brand awareness? Choose the brand awareness goal. You get the idea. Important note: Instagram ads are compatible with the following objectives only:

• Brand awareness
• Reach
• Traffic (website clicks or app store visits)
• App installs
• Engagement (post engagement only)
• Video views
• Conversions (website or in-app conversions)

While these goals are intuitive, some involve additional configuration steps, which we’ll outline below. Brand awareness: No extra steps required! This standard goal aims to show your ads to a wider pool of potential customers who are likely to be interested. While the exact method remains a secret, this goal will likely introduce new and relevant users to your brand. Reach: If maximizing the number of people who see your ads is the goal, ensure you select your Instagram account during ad creation. It’s also worth noting that “reach” is currently the only objective available for Instagram Story ads. A benefit of this goal is the ability to utilize Facebook’s split testing feature, allowing you to A/B test two ads to determine which generates more installs. NOTE: Split testing is also available for Traffic, App Installs, Video Views, Lead Generation, and Conversion goals.

Traffic: Choose this goal to direct more users to your website or app store. Simply choose between the two options, enter the relevant URL, and watch the traffic flow! Engagement: The goal here is simple: more likes, shares, and overall engagement. Keep in mind that you can currently only pay for “post engagement” on Instagram. While Facebook allows payment for “page engagement” and “event responses,” these options aren’t yet available for Instagram.

App Installs: If your primary aim is driving app downloads, this is the right objective. You’ll need to select your app from the app store during the setup process.

Video Views: Videos often require significant time and financial investment, so not promoting them on Instagram is like buying a plane ticket to Hawaii and leaving it unused. Thankfully, this goal is straightforward and requires no additional setup. Lead Generation: Generating more leads is a common goal, and this objective is designed for just that. However, lead generation ads on Instagram don’t offer the same pre-filled fields as Facebook. Currently, Instagram only supports email, full name, phone number, and gender. These ads also have a higher barrier to entry compared to their Facebook counterparts. When users click on an Instagram lead ad, they need to navigate to a separate page to fill out their information. On Facebook, users can provide information directly within the ad. You’ll also need to create a lead form during ad creation. For a deeper dive into lead ads, refer to check out this post.

Conversions: This objective is all about driving conversions on your website or within your app. The additional setup involves configuring a Facebook pixel or app event (depending on your promotional target), allowing you to track conversions effectively.

3. Configuring Your Target Audience

With your objective defined, it’s time to pinpoint your audience, ensuring your ads are seen by the right people. This is where Instagram ads shine, leveraging Facebook’s extensive demographic insights. If you’ve run Facebook ads before, you likely have existing audience segments and are familiar with the process. If not, here’s a rundown of your targeting options, which can be layered to create precisely targeted audiences (e.g., women in New York aged 19-65 interested in yoga and healthy eating). Location: Target by country, region, state, city, zip code, or even include or exclude specific areas.

Age: Target users aged 13 to 65+. Gender: Choose between all, men, or women. Languages: Facebook suggests leaving this field blank unless your target language isn’t common in your chosen location. Demographics: Under “Detailed Targeting," you’ll find “Demographics” with numerous sub-categories and even further sub-divisions within those. For instance, you can target “Demographics” > “Home” > “Home Ownership” > “Renters.”

Interests: Also found under “Detailed Targeting," “Interests” offers a wealth of sub-categories to explore (e.g., distilled beverages, science fiction movies, aviation). Behaviors: Yet another treasure trove of sub-categories under “Detailed Targeting,” “Behaviors” allows you to target based on purchasing habits, job roles, anniversaries, and other behavioral indicators.

Connections: This option enables you to target individuals connected to your page, app, or event. Custom Audience: Upload your own contact list to retarget leads already in your pipeline or upsell to existing customers. Lookalike Audience: If your custom audience has reached its full potential, create a lookalike audience. This instructs Instagram to find users who share traits with your existing audiences. Once you’ve defined your audience, Facebook provides a guide indicating whether your audience is too broad, too narrow (in the red zone), or just right (as seen below).

This tool helps you strike a balance. An excessively large audience might lack focus, while an overly specific audience might leave you with very few people to reach.

4. Selecting Your Placements

With your ideal demographic in sight, it’s time to choose your placements. This step is crucial if you only want your ads to appear on Instagram. Skipping this step allows Facebook to display your ads on both platforms. While this isn’t necessarily detrimental, if you’ve created content specifically for Instagram, select “Edit Placements.”

This allows you to specify Instagram as a placement and choose whether you want your ads to appear in the main feed, the stories section, or both.

5. Setting Your Budget and Ad Schedule

If you’re familiar with budget management in Facebook, AdWords, or other digital advertising platforms, this step will be straightforward. If not, don’t fret! Determining the ideal daily or lifetime budget for your first Instagram ad campaign often involves trial and error. The good news is you can pause or stop your campaign at any time if you feel your budget isn’t being used effectively.

So, daily or lifetime budget? While daily budgets offer greater control over daily spending, lifetime budgets allow for scheduled ad delivery – both options have their merits. It’s also worth exploring the advanced options shown below. For instance, manual bidding gives you granular control over how much each lead is worth to you.

As previously mentioned, you can set an ad schedule to target specific times of day and days of the week when your audience is most active. This is a valuable optimization tactic. Remember, this feature is only available with lifetime budgets.

6. Creating Your Instagram Ad

Finally, it’s time to bring your Instagram ad to life! By now, you should have a clear idea of the content you want to promote. The setup might vary depending on your campaign objective, but you’ll always have several ad formats to choose from. Let’s delve into the different ad formats available.

Exploring Instagram Ad Formats

Get ready to make some decisions! Instagram offers six ad formats (considerably fewer than Facebook!). Two are designed for Instagram Stories, which appear at the top of the feed, similar to Snapchat. The other four are tailored for the Instagram feed and are more commonly used by advertisers.

#1. Image Feed Ads

This is the most common ad format – the one you likely encounter most often while scrolling through your own feed. These ads appear as single images, blending seamlessly with organic content as your target audience scrolls. Done well, these ads don’t even feel like advertisements. Here’s what you need to know: Technical Requirements

• File type: jpg or png
• Maximum file size: 30MB
• Minimum Image Width: 600 pixels
• Image Ratio: 4:5 minimum, 16:9 maximum
• Text length: 2,200 characters maximum (Instagram recommends staying below 90 for optimal delivery)
• Hashtag Number: 30 maximum (you can add more in the comments) Supported Objectives
• Reach
• Traffic
• Conversions
• App Installs
• Lead Generation
• Brand Awareness
• Post Engagement
• Product Catalog Sales
• Store Visits Supported Call-to-Action Buttons
• Apply Now
• Book Now
• Call Now
• Contact Us
• Get Directions
• Learn More
• Get Showtimes
• Download

#2. Image Story Ads

The concept remains the same as above, but these are specifically designed for Instagram Stories! Here are the details: Technical Requirements

• Image Ratio: 9:16 recommended
• Minimum Image Width: 600 pixels Supported Objectives
• Reach
• Traffic
• Conversions
• App Installs
• Lead Generation Supported Call-to-Action Buttons
• Apply Now
• Book Now
• Contact Us
• Download

3. Video Feed Ads

Bring your ads to life with video! If you’ve invested in creating high-quality video content, promoting it through your Instagram feed is a no-brainer. While Instagram supports most video formats, they recommend using H.264 compression, square pixels, fixed frame rate, progressive scan, and stereo AAC audio compression at 128kbps+ (PRO TIP: If your video doesn’t meet these requirements, use a video transcoder like Handbrake to make the necessary adjustments). Technical Requirements

• Video Resolution: 1080 x 1080 pixels (at least)
• Maximum file size: 4GB
• Video Ratio: 4:5 minimum,16:9 maximum
• Video Duration: 60 seconds maximum
• Video Captions: optional
• Image Ratio: 4:5 minimum, 16:9 maximum
• Text length: 125 characters maximum recommended
• Hashtag Number: 30 maximum (you can add more in the comments) Supported Objectives
• Reach
• Traffic
• Conversions
• Lead Generation
• Brand Awareness
• Post Engagement
• Store Visits Supported Call-to-Action Buttons
• Apply Now
• Book Now
• Call Now
• Contact Us
• Download

#4. Video Story Ads

This is another prime location for video ads. Users often expect video content within stories, making the advertising aspect feel less intrusive. The recommended video specifications are the same as above. Keep the following details in mind:

Technical Requirements

• Video Resolution: 1080 x 1920 pixels (at least)
• Maximum file size: 4GB
• Video Ratio: 9:16 maximum
• Video Duration: 15 seconds maximum
• Video Captions: not available Supported Objectives
• Reach
• Traffic
• Conversions
• Lead Generation
• App Installs Supported Call-to-Action Buttons
• Apply Now
• Book Now
• Call Now
• Contact Us
• Download

#5. Carousel Feed Ads

Carousel ads add an element of fun! This format allows you to display a series of scrollable images instead of a single image. This ad type is perfect for visually-driven brands in industries like food, furniture, fashion, travel, and automotive. However, they’re not limited to “flashy” businesses – they can humanize your brand or showcase your company culture, even if you’re in software or finance. The carousel format allows for up to 10 images within a single ad, each with its own unique link. Video is also a supported option. Technical Requirements

• File type: jpg or png
• Maximum file size: 30MB
• Minimum Image Width: 600 pixels
• Image Ratio: 4:5 minimum, 16:9 maximum
• Text length: 2,200 maximum (Instagram recommends staying below 90 for optimal delivery)
• Video Duration: 60 seconds maximum
• Hashtag Number: 30 maximum (you can add more in the comments) Supported Objectives
• Reach
• Traffic
• Conversions
• Brand Awareness
• Lead Generation
• Product Catalog Sales Supported Call-to-Action Buttons
• Apply Now
• Book Now
• Contact Us
• Call Now
• Download

#6. Canvas Story Ads

Last but not least, we have Canvas ads, the newest member of the ad format family. These ads are incredibly immersive, enabling advertisers to create a 360 VR experience within their stories. They’re only viewable on mobile devices, offering a high degree of customization, but require some technical know-how. Canvas ads work with images, videos, and carousels. For a more detailed look at Canvas ads, check out this guide. Technical Requirements

• Minimum Image Width: 400 pixels
• Minimum Image Height: 150 pixels Supported Objectives
• Reach
• Brand Awareness
• Traffic
• Conversions
• Lead Generation
• Post Engagement
• Video Views
• Store Visits Supported Call-to-Action Buttons
• Apply Now
• Book Now
• Contact Us

5 Best Practices for Instagram Advertising

Now that you understand the fundamentals of Instagram advertising, let’s maximize your ROI with these best practices for creating compelling Instagram ads.

#1. Inject Personality into Every Ad

Whether it’s through humor, an emotional video, or an engaging image showcasing your company culture, humanizing your Instagram posts is key to unlocking their full engagement potential. People use Instagram for entertainment, amusement, and inspiration. They’re not logging on to see dull corporate advertisements. Appeal to emotions. Take inspiration from this entertaining post by Shape Magazine.

#2. Prioritize Contextual Relevance

What works on one social media platform might not translate well to another. Your content strategy for LinkedIn will likely differ from your Twitter approach, as the audience mindset varies between platforms. The same principle applies to Instagram. Put yourself in your target audience’s shoes and consider their context. Are they likely to download and read a 40-page e-book while browsing Instagram? Probably not. Avoid overly sales-driven ads – that’s not what Instagram is typically used for.

#3. Utilize Hashtags…

But don’t just use generic hashtags like #food or #love. Get creative and use tools like do some user research to identify hashtags your target audience is actively searching for. And don’t go overboard – too many hashtags can make your posts appear cluttered and desperate. So, what’s the magic number? TrackMaven’s analysis of 65,000 posts revealed that 9 hashtags is the sweet spot for maximum post engagement. They also found that longer hashtags often perform better.

#4. Run Contests

Contests and giveaways are incredibly effective for accelerating your Instagram advertising goals. Why? Because people love competition and free stuff! It’s a fantastic way to generate excitement around your brand.

If you’re looking for guidance on running an Instagram giveaway, check out this insightful post by nexus-security’s very own Dan Shewan.

#5. Post at Optimal Times

We touched on this during the budgeting section, but utilizing the ad-schedule feature (available with lifetime budgets) ensures your ads are seen at the right time.

Via CoSchedule If you understand your audience, determining optimal posting times shouldn’t be too difficult. But a little trial and error can also go a long way. Consider your industry. If you’re an online clothing retailer, when do people typically shop online for clothes? If you’re a car dealership, which days see the highest spike in website traffic? Asking these questions is a good starting point. Now go forth and conquer the world of Instagram advertising! This is one platform you don’t want to ignore, and this guide provides ample resources to set you on the path to Instagram success. Need more help? Check out these resources:

• 24 Instagram Marketing Tools for More Followers, Likes & Sales
• The 15 Best Instagram Marketing Campaigns of the Year
• 10 Killer Instagram Marketing Tips for Brands
• The Complete Guide to Instagram Analytics
• 7 Ways to Boost Holiday Instagram Sales