Instagram is one of the most rapidly growing social media platforms out there. On an average, users post a combined total of over 55 million photos per day. It is therefore, no surprise that marketers from all around the world want to join in on the fun and bring attention to themselves and their brands. When it comes to Instagram marketing, here are some of the top campaigns that you can learn from:
Be unique – Ballantine’s W Insta-zine
With millions of marketing posts per day, you have to stand out to gain customer attention. Ballantine’s did this perfectly by creating a mosaic Insta-zine. For more clarity, take a look at their page. Each issue of the magazine has 3 articles and tapping on each of the images on the page, will take you to an article. The campaign was conducted in 2015 and was a success as it garnered recognition from top social media commenters. More importantly, it made an impact on the users and their marketing worked wonders.
Use your customers – Guerlain
Now that the prevalence of marketing on Instagram has become popular, we see many campaigns that urge users to create their own posts using a specific, unifying hashtag. The French company, Guerlain, were one of the first companies to do it as they promoted their new bronzing powder in 2015. Their hashtags – #Terracotta de #GuerlainTerracotta called for women around Paris to combine the product with their beloved city. Nielsen revealed that the campaign was a great success as over 900,000 women got to know about the product and there was a 15% increase in awareness. Getting your customers involved is a great way to build trust and increase brand loyalty.
Host fun contests – Scotiabank
Scotiabank is one of the biggest banks in Canada. In an effort to reach younger audiences, they decided to break the mundane financial talk by hosting fun games. Once a week, they would host a picture competition that had items, which indicated a movie. Users had to guess which movie it was and post their answers in the comments. As a result of this, they gained thousands of followers and had a 20 point lift in ad recall. Contests are an interesting way to challenge audiences. A little bit of fun can create a great connection between you and your audience.
Product placement – L’Oreal Paris
Successful marketers know that all big campaigns do not need to have a big budget. Instead, using your surroundings and everything in it could be just as effective. Take L’Oreal Paris for example. The top cosmetic company used winter to help them promote their products. They placed their products in contrasting surroundings to highlight them and make them look irresistible. The campaign was conducted during the 2015 blizzard in New York and increased both recommendations and ad recalls. Platforms like Ifluenz can help with this type of marketing.
Help Others – TOMS
Otherwise known as cause marketing, this type of marketing involves combining your brand with a cause and getting your users involved. TOMS did this perfectly in 2015 as they launched an Instagram project to donate shoes to children in need. Their hashtag for the campaign was #WithoutShoes and they aimed to donate a pair every time a user posted a photo of their feet with the hashtag. The goal was to reach one million donations and although this goal was not reached, the campaign was a success. The hashtag was used over 350,000 times in just a few days and TOMS went from an unknown brand to one of the most popular names among tech savvy customers.