How to Leverage Instagram Shop to Boost your Sales

People-browsing-through-instagram-shop
How to leverage instagram shop to boost sales

If you’re a D2C brand with an Instagram business profile, we are sure you have tons of posts with ‘Link in bio’ in the caption. And that link would lead to a landing page with amazing products that you would like your customers to purchase. How often do you end up losing the customer in this process and wonder what went wrong? Think of it from their perspective— You see a post of a product you love and click the ‘link in bio’. Once you land on the page, you see another product among-st the product catalog that is amazing, and another, and another! And now, you’ve lost track of what you wanted to buy, and end up all confused. 

If only there was a way to avoid all this and shop directly from Instagram! Well, there is! Instagram Shop, an exciting feature from Instagram, lets you do just that! Your social media content should be creative enough to hook your target audience and intelligent enough to create sales out of it. But before we dive into that, you can read through our blog on Instagram Marketing to know the basics of it.

Note: To reap the benefits of this cool feature, you need to have a ‘Professional’ account on Instagram. You can check it under ‘settings’ on your Instagram page (refer to the image below).

Need-professional-account-to-set-up-instagram-shop
Instagram account screenshot

What Is An Instagram Shop?

Instagram Shop is a trending feature rolled out by Instagram that allows brands to showcase their products and catalogs directly on the platform with a high quality customizable storefront. This feature allows customers to see the product description without navigating to the brand’s website – making the shopping experience easier.

According to Instagram, 70% of shoppers turn to the platform to discover new products while browsing through their feed. With the Instagram shop feature, you will be able to attract all those future customers, connect with your target market & build brand visibility. It allows you to showcase your best selling products on Instagram, while also giving you the opportunity to direct your potential customers to your ecommerce platform.  

The GIF below shows how a virtual shopfront on Instagram actually works. The brand, once it activates Instagram shopping, automatically has the “View Shop” feature on its page. Once the user clicks on that tab, the virtual shop front opens up with various products showing in the catalog. Once the user selects the product, for the Indian users, she will be directed to the brand’s website, where they can finalize the payment, checkout and make the purchase.

instagram shop example
Credit: Sleepycat

While we’ve always been a fan of brands promoting themselves on Instagram, here’s why we think Instagram Shop is the next big thing in marketing for D2C brands:

  • No more affected conversion rates— Your users get to see your products and buy them instantly without having to go through multiple checkpoints
  • Product tagging on organic posts— You read it right. With Instagram Shop, you can tag products on organic posts and get your users to shop from the posts
  • Easy discovery and high visibility— While you tag your products, your post will be added to Instagram’s Shopping Explore tab. That means more eyes on your product with genuine interest to buy

However, here’s the deal with the brands in India: Instagram shop option is only available to brands that currently fall under managed clients. Managed clients are businesses whose accounts are being managed or being given access to some features of Instagram by Facebook (now Meta). Currently, your best bet at becoming a managed client is to fulfill these requirements set by the platform and wait for the Facebook team to get in touch with you.

Note: Instagram checkout option is still unavailable in India. Users have to visit the website to purchase and finish the payment.

Don’t let that stop you! Very soon, the feature will be rolled out in full swing in India. In this blog, we tell you what you have to do to be prepared for this change.

How To Set Up An Instagram Shop In India?

Before we begin, note that Instagram Shop is available only for tangible, physical products on the Instagram app. The feature is not available for services. Also,  make sure your business complies to Instagram’s merchant agreement and commerce policies.

As a first step, you will have to choose the Catalog Manager option (see the image below) in Facebook Business Manager. As Instagram pulls in all required details from Facebook, it is smart to have this filled and updated beforehand. 

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Instagram account

You can add product pictures, descriptions, and pricing manually or sync your website/ Woocommerce store or Shopify store with your Facebook business page. Your developer will be able to help you here. Once you update the catalog details, all you need to do is wait for the feature to roll in. Once the feature is available for all businesses in India, you will have to connect the Instagram account to the Facebook catalog. And voila, your Instagram shop is set.

Bonus: Make sure you add descriptions and all details for all the products so as to make it easier for the customers to buy without any second thoughts.

See how Blue Tokai Coffee has provided a clear product information in the catalog:

example-of-instagram-shop
Credit: Blue Tokai Coffee

Now that you know how to set up your shop on Instagram, learn how you can create shoppable posts and stories.

How To Create Shoppable Posts And Stories On Instagram?

We are fans of strategic Instagram posts that lead to conversions. Once your shop is set up on Instagram, all you will have to do is create content to promote your products and reach out to the Instagram users.

Let’s begin with a perfect example. See how Juicy Chemistry has brilliantly promoted their product and their shop in this post:

screenshot-of-instagram-shoppable
Credit: Juicy Chemistry

If you’ve been following our blog, you’ll know what we love about this post! Yes, the image is perfect, what with its central placement of the product and filling up the rest of the image with the prime ingredients used in the product. What we love more is how they have given a clear description of the product, with subtle CTAs towards the end of the caption. Most of all, we like how they have directed the user to view the shop for purchasing the product. You can also check our blog on how to design the best Instagram ads for ideas for your next ad campaign. 

So, what goes behind creating your first Instagram shopping ad?

  • Add media and description like you usually would for any organic post on Instagram
  • Next, click on ‘Tag Products’ and start tagging the product that is on the photo. Make sure you use the same name for the product as in the catalog
  • Once done, you can go ahead and post the media on Instagram

Does the shoppable feature on Instagram Stories work in the same way? Well, this is what a shoppable story on Instagram looks like:

shop-tags-in-instagram-stories
Credit: Instagram

What you see here is a story posted by Sleepy Cat, where they have shared a newspaper clipping that talks about one of their products. They have gone ahead and tagged the product in the story, which is clickable and leads to their storefront on Instagram.

How can you create a similar story on Instagram?

  • Add media to the story like you normally would 
  • Once you’re done adding the required elements to the story, click on the ‘Product’ sticker and tag your product with the same
  • Go ahead and post the story on Instagram

Want to promote it? Go ahead and boost this post or story and set up Instagram ads. If you’re not sure how Instagram ads work, read our blog post on how to draft an Instagram ads strategy that gets you maximum conversion. 

How To Measure Instagram Shopping Analytics?

Out of all the steps in the process, this must be the easiest. Instagram goes all-in in ensuring that brands have a hassle-free experience on the platform. One feature as part of this experience is the ‘Insights’ tab. Here, you can find insights into all the content you post on Instagram. 

When it comes to insights on the shopping feature, you’ll be able to view insights on how people interact with your shopping content when you tag products in the posts and stories. The following metrics will help you track your performance with respect to Instagram Shop.

  • Product views: The total number of times people tapped on the product tag to view the product page
  • Product button clicks: The total number of times people tapped on the purchase button on the product page

While it is true that Instagram Shop is a little extra work to set up, once the feature is rolled in fully, you will see your sales skyrocket. Have you already set up a shop on Instagram? Let us know in the comments section below.

Want to learn more about how to promote your brand on Instagram, we have a list of useful resources for you below:

Easily Track All Metrics with Velocity Insights

We understand how frustrating it can be to track each and every number the company achieves, especially when you do not have a robust tool in place. So, we launched Velocity Insights – a one-stop solution to track all your metrics from various online platforms. Connect your online selling platforms with Velocity Insights in just a few minutes and get a daily business snapshot delivered to your WhatsApp every morning.

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