Tips on Instagram for Business.

Is Social Media important for businesses?  Yes it is, and maybe soon people will stop asking that question. By now it should be a part of all marketing, advertising and PR plans.

Importantly, if your business is marketing to Gen Y or Millenials (those with birth years starting in 1980s to early 2000s), Instagram is an easy way to reach this audience and should be included in your business marketing strategy.

Is Instagram here to stay? Who knows, maybe not. But for now it's here and it's big with over 200 million users worldwide. So get on board.

Here's a quote by writer Lisa Hoover McGreevy from her article on "How to Rock Instagram."
"In a recent study of how users interact with brands’ social media posts, Forrester Research found that when it comes to engagement, Instagram is far superior to any other social network. While six of the seven social networks Forrester studied had an engagement rate of less than 0.1%, Instagram’s engagement rate was 4.21%."

The audience reach with Instagram can be huge. Some celebrities have over 12 million followers each, (@justinbieber and @kimkardashian, for example).  Major brands such as @starbucks and @adidas have 2 or 3 million followers.

What Is Instagram.  Instagram is an online photo sharing, video sharing social media platform.  You can use filters on the pictures to create all sorts of effects, put comments on pictures, tag people your pictures, and use hashtags. You "follow" accounts and get followed by others. You can comment on or "like" other people's pictures and videos, and you can share them too across other media outlets, such as facebook and twitter. It's fast moving in that people are uploading multiple pictures all the time. In Instagram time, yesterdays picture could be old news.  There's a hashtag for that, #latergram.

For just pure fun use, Instagram is easy and can be very entertaining. However, using Instagram effectively for your business takes some planning and thought.

Here are some basic steps that will help you get started:

Complete your profile. Your profile tells the world who you are and what your business is. Yes, you can write cute stuff here, but be sure include the important things such as your website, your phone number and your location. Instagram is global. Not everyone knows where "Your Town" is. Also use an appropriate profile picture, something that you want people to recognize your business with. Usually that is a logo.

What to post.  You should post images relevant to your business of course, but general interest pictures are also a good way to engage your followers. For example, if you are a chair manufacturer, don't only post images of chairs. That can get old after a while. One idea is to use "behind the scenes" content. Post pictures of what goes on in your chair factory, behind the scenes. Where does the wood come from, how are designs created, what are your employees like? The beauty of social media is getting a glimpse behind the curtain of peoples lives, or businesses.

@Oreo, the cookie, is often used as an example of a company that does its Instagram marketing well by "telling a story", using their brand in a million different ways.  Their message is not just "here's an Oreo cookie", but it's shows all the different ways their cookie is in our lives.  Their Instagram profile says, "OREO, see the world through our OREO Wonderfilled lens."  

Post Frequently. Schedule your postings, if you have to. Find what works, the more you post the more traction and publicity you'll get.  Remember, not everyone is viewing Instagram all the time, so your can get lost in the hundreds of other images on every one's feed. Don't hesitate to repeat a post; Chances are many of your followers didn't catch it the first time around and now maybe they will.

Write a caption for each image you post. A picture might be worth a thousand words, but it's better if you use some words. It's your first chance to write something about what you are showing. Don't let your clients/customers guess what you are posting about.

Use hashtags wisely. Hashtags are used for searching out topics and categorizing each post. If you're a realtor or a real estate agency and you keep using #oaklandrealestate for relevant posts, chances are, a potential client might find you when they search for "oakland real estate" in Instagram. So while #thisweatheriscraycray might be cute, it doesn't really serve any function to promote your business. Always use a hashtag for your product name or any relevant words for your business and/or tag your business name in your own post.

Take a good picture. Instagram is pretty amazing in that it can transform almost any bad picture into a work of art. But it can only do so much.  Make sure your product is clearly visible and in focus. Many of the filters Instagram provides will actually brighten up your picture significantly, making it pop.

Give photo credit. If you use someone else's picture, give them credit by tagging the photo or at least giving their name in the caption. It's an important courtesy that is easy to forget about.

Respond to comments. It is "social" media after all, so be social and interact with your followers whenever you can. Try to be interactive with others and always respond to direct questions, promptly. Depending on how busy your account is, you can also respond to non question comments. Use the "@" when responding so that the commenter knows you have responded to him or her. The beauty of social media is that customers can get an immediate response from you, and all the other viewers can see your interactions.

Get more followers.  The more followers you have, the bigger your audience is. You can pay to get followers or you can get them naturally. Following others will help you get followers. Apparently #followforfollow is the most commonly used hashtag of all hashtags.  Follow those that compliment your business and those that interest you personally.  If you are a realtor, you might want to follow architects, stagers, developers, home inspectors, other realtors, restaurants, etc.  Often if you follow someone, they will automatically follow you back. If you comment on other accounts, all those followers see your account. This increases your own account visibility and allows you to get more followers.

Here are my own favorite Instagram pictures that I have posted on my account @lwhitney25:

#lakemerritt #companymeeting #highlandpartners

#openhousesunday #piedmonthomes #realtorsigns

#highlandpartnerads #newlook

#cupkatestruck #saltedcaramel #schoolpicnic

#mylisting #oaklandrealestate #oaklandhills

Urban Chalet.

If I ever have a renovation, remodel or design project to do, I know who to call.

Angela and I met as cubicle neighbors at our banking jobs, in San Francisco, back in the heydays of the late 1990's.  We were in our 20's, single, and executive assistants to investment bankers.

She was a great assistant, because she was so good at organizing all the high end functions like closing dinners and client events such as trips to Napa Valley wine tastings, and "roadshows", where bankers traveled, looking for investors. She had endless energy, tons of ideas, very high standards and nothing threw her off.

While she had her day job in banking, she was busy remodeling her old Victorian house in the city. At one point she and her husband had the whole thing lifted up to fix the foundation.  They pretty much did it themselves.  I was impressed then.  She also did endless decorating and improving everything in the house, from bedding, to flooring, to window coverings. She liked things custom, high quality and unique.  It wasn't surprising that on her honeymoon to Indonesia, she ended up buying a crate full of custom made ultra heavy, solid wood furniture, (oh, and she did this while battling a horrible intestinal illness she pick up there, putting her in the hospital.)

People noticed her style and her work ethic. While she was still working at the investment bank, (she eventually became a financial analyst), clients and co-workers wanted her help and hired her to get things done.  She had high-end clients who needed high end help, whether it was party planning, decorating or organizing.  Word spread and she got busier and busier with bigger jobs, eventually leading to remodeling and designing multi million dollar homes.

She left the investment banking world and started her business which would be called Urban Chalet, www.Urban-Chalet.com.  From out of her San Francisco living room she helped clients with interior design, site design, project management and custom furnishings. She took on assignments in California, to Park City, New York and beyond.  She got her clients purely from word of mouth.

Urban Chalet kept growing, Angela's living room hasn't been large enough for her business for a while, and so Urban Chalet has expanded to several office spaces in San Bruno, San Francisco and New York City, with a total of 17 employees, including her brother and sister.

Angela, and some of her ideas...

Displays of design projects, ideas and concepts.

They are currently designing and managing over 25 projects annually, with budgets ranging from $10 thousand to $45 million.

I visited her recently at their San Bruno offices.  The last time I saw her office it was in her living room, and now it's in a large office complex with several rooms, everyone sitting at open desks, with large tables, shelving and walls full of samples and drawings and ideas.

Things to come; Urban Chalet is designing their own line of furniture. Miniatures on a shelf.

A beautiful coffee table book, of course.

Angela has an amazing sense of style, is one of the hardest working people I know, with incredible amount of responsibility and stress and yet she is always happy and laughs at everything. (I remember once I was with her when she got a call that a shipping container of materials she had to have at her work site in the Bay Area, pronto, was stuck in customs in Los Angeles, holding up the entire project. I was so stressed out for her when I heard this, yet it didn't phase her one bit. She got on the phone and worked it out.)

Angela and I are now in our 40's, have been in each others weddings (she did my flowers!) and have had a few kids.  But other than that, not much has changed, she's still the same hard working, positive person I always new.

I look forward to working with Angela and Urban Chalet one day.  Either for my own project or with a client. I know we'd all be in good hands and get amazing results!

Ideas on large tables.