Rise with Reels: How to utilise the power of Instagram for your business

Instagram isn’t going anywhere! In fact, it is just getting bigger and bigger. In order to utilise the platform best you need to understand that your audience wants more than just selling. They want to be inspired, educated, and entertained. One of the biggest mistakes you can do is try to sell too much!

Instagram Reels were introduced one year ago and have absolutely changed the way the platform works. Your audience’s attention span is only getting shorter and shorter, so, to get your message across before they swipe past, you need to grab their attention quickly and give them a reason to stick around.

And while you don’t need to be posting reels every day, nor posting to Instagram every day, you do need to be ensuring you’re being consistent and sharing content that your audience craves.

Share reels that make them want to watch it over and over again; tag and share with friends; and make them want to follow you so they can buy from you later. 

Here are my do’s and don’ts of making reels for your business: 

Do

1. Be time savvy

   Utilise the first three seconds — these few seconds are key to making sure your audience doesn’t scroll past!

2. Create your own strategy

   Your business is different to anyone else’s out there — so you need to ensure that your strategy is unique and based on yourself and your audience (not just what is working for everyone else!)

3. Keep it short

   The shorter your reel is, the more likely your audience will watch it over and over again

4. Include a clear CTA

   If you want conversions from your reels, you must include a clear call-to-action. Do you want sales, comments, follows, DMs? Make sure you tell your audience that! Otherwise, they are likely to just keep on scrolling past you

5. Clean your phone

   Wipe the phone lens before filming — you’d be surprised at what a difference this can make in the quality of your reel

6. Include transitions

   Include transitions to surprise and wow your audience. This will help to maintain their attention and keep them peeled on what you have to say

7. Stay on brand

   Include your branding within your reels. Use your business colours with text within the reels, and stick to the same (or similar) fonts for consistent branding

8. Remember the ratios

   Make sure to use the full screen space! The ratio for reels is 9:16

9. Build comments

   Engage with the people who are engaging with you! When someone else comments, ensure you comment back with a genuine comment. Even add in a question to prompt them for another comment back

10. Include hashtags

    Reels are so powerful to get more eyes on you and your content, so utilise hashtags at the end of your caption or in the first comment. Remember to always use hashtags that are relevant to the content you’re sharing!

Don’t

1. Use too much time

   Don’t use more time, just because Instagram has extended the option to have reels up to 60 seconds long. Keep them short!

2. Overpost

   Don’t post every day, just for the sake of posting every day. Quality over quantity always wins!

3. Include watermarks

   Don’t include watermarks from third party apps like TikTok

4. Be tone deaf

   Don’t use boring audio that doesn’t help communicate the message or emotion you’re aiming for. Keep it fun!

5. Play copycat

   Don’t just rely on trends or do what every one else is doing. Be unique!

6. Cover your face

   Don’t let the text cover your eyes or mouth (if possible!)

7. Go off centre

   Don’t have the text appearing off to the edges — try to keep the text as centred as possible.

8. Be poorly lit

   Using harsh/dark lighting will lower the quality of the reel and increase dark shadows

9. Stay static

   Don’t just use images, as it is hard to make that engaging and instead will make it will be more like a slide show. That is not what reels were intended for!

10. Post and ghost

    Don’t post and then ghost… before and after posting your reel, try and stay online and spend a bit of time engaging with others

With constant lockdowns, Instagram is your digital shopfront and, fortunately, it doesn’t close! This is the reliable shopfront you need to get you through the everchanging environment we’re living in.

If there has ever been the “right time” to get onto Instagram and really utilise the power of the platform, it’s right now!