Instagram marketing strategies, such as posting engaging content and leveraging influencer marketing, have become top choices for social media marketing teams.
While these strategies help grab users’ attention, they may not be the most effective ways to sell on Instagram. You can only hope that customers remember to visit your site after seeing shopping ads or coming across your posts.
Instagram Shopping is a whole different story. It lets you take advantage of every moment with your audience by enabling them to view and purchase your products directly from the app.
Read on to learn the what, why, and how of an Instagram Shop, so you can leverage social media as an effective sales channel.
What is Instagram Shop?
Imagine a feature that lets your target audience explore your product catalog and complete purchases on Instagram. That’s exactly what an Instagram Shop is. It’s sort of like a bridge between your Instagram profile and website or e-commerce platform.
It provides seamless access to these sites, and for businesses in the U.S., the in-app Instagram checkout feature allows customers to make purchases right in the app. Think of it as an Instagram digital storefront.
With the Instagram Shopping feature, the platform adds a “View Shop” button to your posts to direct potential customers to your product catalog. All they need to do is tap the product tags included in the posts to purchase on the app or view the exact product on your website.
This level of convenience is one of the main reasons why brands are turning to shoppable posts. When customers don’t need to leave the app to search for your product catalog on your e-commerce platform manually, they’re more likely to buy from you.
The Shopping feature also allows you to tap into the power of impulse buying. If customers can buy immediately when they come across your post, you minimize the risk of losing sales to cold feet.
Numerous brands, including beauty brand Glossier and fashion company Fashion Nova, use Instagram Shops to tap into the platform’s extensive user base.
Why should you set up an Instagram Shop for your business?
With roughly 2 billion people actively using Instagram every month, marketing your brand on the platform is a no-brainer. Odds are, you’ve already implemented creative marketing strategies like leveraging QR Codes for Instagram to boost your visibility among the billions of users on the platform.
Setting up an Instagram Shop is another great move that can boost your success on the platform. Here are the benefits of taking advantage of this feature.
Increased visibility
If you’re looking for ways to increase brand awareness on the platform, it may be time to create shoppable Instagram posts.
With Instagram Shopping, the platform showcases your products on specific demographics’ Explore pages (based on their interest in products like yours). This increases your visibility among audiences that are likely to convert. Even if they don’t immediately buy from you, their interaction with your posts can help you expand your audience reach and increase brand awareness.
Direct sales channel
Businesses that don’t provide a direct sales channel run the risk of losing sales to cold feet and forgetfulness, as they give customers a lot of time to rethink (or forget) their buying decisions.
An Instagram Shop solves this problem. It integrates with your brand’s existing e-commerce platform, allowing customers to buy products immediately when they come across them, resulting in increased sales.
Enhanced customer engagement
Instagram Shop allows for better customer engagement through interactive features like shopping tags and product stickers. Customers can easily tap on these tags and stickers to view product details on the app, promoting a seamless shopping experience. This can result in higher engagement rates and, consequently, sales.
How to easily set up an Instagram Shop
By now, you already know that setting up a Shop is one of the best Instagram tips for businesses looking to offer more convenience to their customers and increase sales. The next step is to learn how to set one up. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to get your Shop up and running.
1. Check if your business is eligible for an Instagram Shop
Not all Instagram users can set up stores on the platform. So, first things first, check whether your account meets Instagram’s eligibility requirements, listed below:
- It must represent a business located in a supported market. Meta provides a list of eligible countries for confirmation.
- It must comply with Meta’s policies, including Instagram’s Terms of Use and Community Guidelines.
- It must sell an eligible physical product. (Note: You can’t set up an Instagram Shop for services.)
- It must demonstrate trustworthiness.
- It must provide accurate product details, including item descriptions, availability information, pricing, and company return policies.
- It must be an Instagram business account. If you have a personal one, switch to a professional or creator account to apply for a Shop.
- Your business must own your e-commerce platform or the website domain you want to sell from.
Previously, you also had to connect your Facebook Page to your business account to set up an Instagram Shop. While this is no longer a requirement, doing so can expand your reach, so it’s worth considering.
2. Connect the Instagram account to a Facebook catalog
As mentioned earlier, you don’t need to connect your Facebook Page and Instagram account to qualify for a store. But it helps to do so. If you have a Facebook account, connect the two by following these steps:
- Open your Instagram account and go to Edit Profile.
- Navigate to Public Business Information and choose Page.
- Select the Facebook Business Page you want to connect to or create a new one.
That’s it!
When you’re done, connect your Instagram account to your Facebook catalog—a compilation of information about the items you want to sell. You can create a catalog by doing the following:
- Open Commerce Manager within Meta Business Manager
- Tap Catalog
- Select Add Products
- Tap Add Manually
- Add product information like names, descriptions, availability, variants, etc.
Alternatively, you can import items from an existing e-commerce database (e.g., BigCommerce, Shopify, ChannelAdvisor, etc.) to your Facebook catalog by integrating the two. To do so:
- Go to Commerce Manager.
- Select Get started, then Create a shop, and finally, Sync a partner platform.
- Follow the link to your chosen platform, then follow the prompts provided to complete the setup process.
3. Submit the account for review
To start selling on Instagram, you need to submit your account for approval. This step is straightforward—log into your Instagram business profile, go to Menu, then Settings, then Sign up for shopping, and follow the prompts provided.
It can take anywhere from one day to a few weeks for the platform to approve new Instagram Shops. If you’re approved, you’ll receive a notification saying, “Start Tagging Now.”
If not, Instagram will let you know why you weren’t approved so you can rectify the issue and re-submit your account. For example, they may say your account doesn’t follow Instagram’s commerce policies or eligibility requirements. In this case, you’ll need to review the policies to determine what to change.
4. Enable shopping features
Once you’re approved, you can get right into selling by activating shopping features. Here’s a step-by-step:
- Open your profile
- Tap on the three-line menu icon
- Select Settings, then Privacy
- Choose Business, then Shopping
- Select the product catalog you want to connect to your account
- Tap Done to complete this step
When you’re done, you can move on to tagging products to allow people to buy from your Stories and posts. Here’s how:
- Tap the + button on your Instagram homepage.
- Upload your images or videos.
- Enter the product information you want your audience to know.
- Tap the Tag products button. You’ll see a search bar—use it to find and select the items you want to sell from your catalog.
- Tap Done and share the selected product via your Feed or Reels.
If you want to promote a product on Stories, you can add a link sticker to your Instagram Story. Just go to the top-right corner, tap the sticker icon, and choose the product you want to sell. Instagram will post the product along with a link to your Shop.
5. Optimize your product catalog tags and images
Creating an Instagram Shop will undoubtedly help you sell. But this alone may not be enough—you also need to optimize your product catalog tags and images to maximize sales. Here’s how:
- Make sure all visuals (images and videos) are high-quality to capture potential customers’ attention and create a professional appearance.
- Provide clear, concise, and persuasive product descriptions with all the information customers need to make buying decisions.
- Use hashtags to reach a wider audience.
- Add calls to action (CTAs) to let potential customers know what to do.
- Experiment with different elements—like videos vs. images or Instagram Stories vs. Instagram Feed—and monitor your click rates to identify what resonates with your target audience.
Track your Instagram Shop performance better with Bitly
An Instagram Shop can help you increase your brand visibility, awareness, and sales. But to really make an impact, you’ll need to use the right tools and strategies to capitalize on your new sales channel.
Bitly can help! While you can’t use your own links on Instagram Shop, you can use branded Bitly Links on your Stories and Instagram ads to direct traffic to your product page. With these links, you’ll get real-time engagement data and in-depth insights into customer behavior, so you can monitor your performance on the platform for continuous optimization.
Sign up for a Bitly account today to create branded, trackable links to enhance your performance on Instagram!