Does your hotel have an Instagram account? If so, it’s probably listed as a business account. If not, you should make one then come back to this article. Having a business account for your hotel gives you access to certain features that regular accounts don’t have. 

These features help you grow your profile and expand your audience through analytics and business tools such as ads. A business account also gives your hotel more credibility to users who stumble across your posts and can make them more likely to follow or engage with your content.

The Power of Instagram Business Tools

With an Instagram business account, a whole host of options become available that can help your hotel qualify the time spent marketing on Instagram. With advanced analytics, you can track all sorts of data such as how far your posts reached and follower demographics. You can even create sponsored posts to get your content in front of the right audience. 

This powerful tool allows you to not only target travelers but gives you insights into how you can improve your strategies in order to launch more effective campaigns in the future. Using this data makes your marketing stronger and lends more value to your social media marketing efforts.

Some insights you’ll be able to find at a glance include the impressions and reach your posts received and how many people clicked your profile link to visit your website this week. You can also sort other data to find out what your best Instagram posts are. Let’s take a deeper look at how you can utilize Instagram business tools.

Followers

The followers section can help inform when and what to post based on your followers’ demographics and behaviors. Here you can find information about your followers including what hours and days they are most active on Instagram. It’s a good idea to check out this information before creating your audience for promotions to have the highest impact and get the biggest bang for your buck.

Top Posts

In the Top Posts section, you can tap See More to find out which posts are doing the best in terms of your business goals. Tap the area at the top to change the post type, time frame, and metric to learn what your best posts were. Then, by tapping on one of the photos that appear from the applied filter, you can select View Insights to see the performance.

You can also access these insights by tapping on any photo on your profile that was posted after your switch to a business profile. However, if you’re planning on promoting a post, it’s best to first go through Top Posts to identify what will perform well.

Sponsored Posts

To get your posts in front of more people, you can promote them. Simply set the action button, audience, budget, and duration, and your post will be served to other Instagram users. If you set a custom audience, you’ll be able to see in the budget tab how many people your ad will be able to reach.

The automatic audience is built by Instagram using information it knows from both Facebook and Instagram behaviors. For instance, if someone likes your Facebook page but doesn’t follow you on Instagram, they would likely receive your ads. Or, If a user follows another user who follows your account, plus has related Facebook interest, they may also be targeted for your ad. If someone finds the ad irrelevant to their interests, they are able to hide it, which helps Facebook and Instagram continue to learn what people want to see.

Once a post is promoted, it can show up in the feeds of your chosen audience. The ad will display Sponsored in the top right corner, which helps users understand why they’re seeing content from someone they aren’t following. Sponsored posts can be optimized to either drive traffic to your website or to encourage an action, such as calling or getting directions to your business.

Complete Your Social Media Strategy

With so many profiles to manage along with your duty to exceed guest expectations on property, keeping up with consistent, quality posting can seem overwhelming. If you need help with posts to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Linkedin so you can focus on continuing to provide guests with exceptional guest experiences, check out our Social Media solution. 

By combining our content creation, posting, audience-building program, and easy-to-manage OneView platform with the experience you’re already providing on-property, you can grow your audience and reach more travelers. For more information on how to create an effective Instagram strategy, check out this webinar.