If you want to get more sales from social media, Instagram is the best social network you can use. With the average order value from Instagram sitting at $65, this visual social media channel is THE place to be.
Not only does it rank second highest for average order value among the top social networks (beating out sites like Pinterest, Facebook, Reddit, Twitter, and more), but the conversion rate of an Instagram visit is a mind-blowing 1.08%!
Bottom line: if you want to make the most of Instagram sales potential, you need to include video that gets a whopping 21.2% more interactions than images.
Sure, creating videos might require more time than images, but the trade off is well worth it.
Only 16.7% of all posts are video on Instagram. That’s a huge opportunity to stand out from the competition and win more engagement.
Whether you run an ecommerce store, a blog, or a brick and mortar business, you CAN absolutely create a variety of videos to sell on Instagram.
Below, I share the best ways to use video on Instagram to sell more of your products or service.
Let’s dive in!
1. Create Engaging Video Content (Without Being Salesy)
You might wonder why I’m asking you to create videos that don’t sell when I just wrote in detail about creating videos that sell? It’s simple.
If you want to get more sales out of Instagram, you need to educate and entertain people with fun, free content before you sell.
It’s akin to marketing with any other medium. You always spend an ample of amount of time educating and nurturing your subscribers with free content through lead magnets and email newsletter sequences to gain their trust.
You only start promoting your products when trust is at an all time high down the road.
You do the same thing when you market with Instagram. You create and share highly engaging content first and build up trust. As they begin to trust you more, you can create Instagram posts that promote products.
The best part about following this strategy is that it favors the Instagram algorithm.
When you share more quality content, more of your followers will engage with it.
This will ensure more people see your content in the future since Instagram likes to show your content to people who have interacted with it in the past.
So, when you boost engagement with content and later share posts that promote products, more people will see them. This in turn will get you more sales.
As I mentioned, video drives the highest engagement on Instagram. Therefore, if you create and share helpful video content, you can boost your engagement to much higher levels.
Don’t worry if you have no idea how to create videos as you can use a tool like Crello. It comes with templates and an easy to use video editor that simplify the process of creating Instagram videos.
All you need to do is visit the Dashboard and choose whether you want to create an ‘Animated Post’ for your Instagram feed or an ‘Instagram Video Story’.
After that you can choose a design and edit it or add new elements like extra animations, overlay text and more.
For ideas on how to create engaging videos you should checkout Joe Wick’s, The Body Coach, Instagram page. He shares a lot of helpful video content in the form of recipe videos and exercising techniques.
An example is the above video where he’s showing you how to make banana and blueberry oat breakfast muffins. Your video content should be helpful like this.
Videos like these won’t get you sales directly, but they’ll work indirectly by driving up engagement and build up trust.
So, when you share more promotional videos later they’ll reach more of your followers who will want to work with you or buy your products.
2. Create Video Content That Entertains, Educates, and Sells
Believe it or not, you can create video content that educates and sells at the same time. This is where you use your products in your video, but instead of just focusing on selling them, you use them to demonstrate something useful.
For example, if you sell edible groceries, you show people how to use them while cooking or if you sell clothing, you show people how to dress better.
For a clear idea, check out this video from Birchbox where they show you how to style your hair.
And while they do that, they show a couple of the products they are using while styling it.
They sell these products on their website. So, it is a great way for them to not only educate their followers, but also sell at the same time.
You should also be creating videos like these that both educate and sell. This is because videos that are very promotional will not drive the same engagement levels as educational or entertaining content.
When you mix the two, you’ll ensure that more people engage with your videos and learn about your products.
It will also help you maintain your high edgerank and reach more people with future posts.
3. Create Video Content That Only Focuses on Selling
Along with creating videos that are both educational and promotional, you should also create promotional videos that only focus on selling.
These videos might not drive as much engagement as the above videos, but they can have a stronger impact on sales.
Experiment by creating videos of both types on a regular basis and track sales of your products to see which one has a better impact. This way you can create more of the videos that bring you the best results.
For an example of promotional video ideas for your business, check out Chobani’s Instagram page. They regularly create videos like the one below thats sole focus is on selling.
4. Create Content By Teaming Up With Influencers
Once you generate some revenue by creating video content for your own account, you should team up with influencers to create sponsored videos about your products.
This is because Instagram is the best social network for Influencer marketing. By working with influencers you can reach more followers than just your own.
The type of video you create for this (just promotional or mix) should depend on what works for you and what works for the influencer and the companies they have worked with in the past.
To find these influencers you can use a tool like Ninja Outreach.
Go to their ‘Instagram Influencers’ tab under ‘Search’. Then type in your niche name and search.
Ninja Outreach will then show the top influencers in that niche and their engagement rates.
For an example of how to use video to sell by teaming up with influencers, check out Lucy Bee.
They regularly team up with the influencer I mentioned above, The Body Coach. He uses their coconut oil in his cooking recipes.
Like in this one on how to make Carrot Cake Energy Balls.
They make sure that the product is clearly displayed in the video and their Instagram handle is tagged in the description. This makes it easy for people to find the products.
If possible, you should also get the influencer to temporarily change the URL in their Instagram bio to the landing page of your product. This can get you even more sales.
Ready to Get Started?
This is the process to use when you want to sell with video on Instagram. But don’t just follow one or two of the tips above. You should follow all of them.
Start off by creating engaging and educational video content.
Once the free video content builds up trust and increases your Instagram engagement, move onto sharing videos that both educate and sell.
Finally, after you generate some revenue from these free methods, you can move onto paid methods like Instagram Ads.
Do you use videos to sell on Instagram? Which techniques have worked best for you? Please leave your comments below.
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