Instagram Reels is one of the latest Instagram trends that is creating buzz within the marketing community for its powerhouse of engagement, followers, ability to post content virtually anywhere on Instagram, and its appeal to younger generations. 

As social media platforms continue to advance their own apps with more and more features and places to shop and market on, it is important to understand these updates and their importance for any business or brand. 

This is what Instagram Reels is all about and three marketing to-dos. 

What are Instagram Reels? 

Instagram Reels provides Insta users with the ability to consume and interact with short-form content on the app which has now switched to “prioritize video” content first. These entertaining, informative and relevant videos are anywhere from 30 seconds to 60 seconds long. 

The best part about reels for marketers, and companies alike, is that Reels will show in the Instagram feed and can be promoted with Instagram Stories. 

Talk about killing two birds with one stone if you spend the time on one piece of really awesome and engaging content. This is one of the most perfect Instagram trends because there isn’t a need for a ton of editing! 

Is this the engagement hack you have been searching for? Here are three to-dos for this social strategy and management of posts. 

The three to-dos of Instagram Reels

Share informational content

There is actually a rule behind this first to-do in the social media marketing world. It is called the 80/20 rule. The 80/20 rule means that only 20 percent of your content should be promotional content, the other 80 percent of the content should be informative, engaging, and useful to your target audience. 

This is a large component of any social strategy and management of Instagram marketing because consumers want information content. A constant stream of content that is only selling products and services can negatively impact engagement, following, leads, and sales. 

What are some different ideas that a company can post about in any industry? 

Informational content

• DIYs 

• Blog posts

• Articles

• Advice or insights

• Industry trends

• Behind the scenes

Promotional content

• Sales

• Coupons

• Seasonal discounts

• Weekly sales

• Constant “we are so great” content

There is a fine line between promotional content and informational, and in our social strategy and management industry, our experts have noticed there is an art to making informational content a bit promotional and promotional content informational. 

A/B test, everything

Did a post perform better than other ones? If a post outperforms organically, or you notice a continued success posting about a specific product or service, it is important to take that content and constantly modify it! 

If you launched a new product, and the FAQ post is doing great, how can you take advantage of that by modifying it? Will the second version perform better or falter? 

Create authentic content

There are over one billion active users on Instagram, and with that many users, there are hundreds and millions of different personal and business brands out there selling their products. Whether it is influencers or B2B marketing strategies, there is an audience out there and an opportunity to reach that audience, but only with the right strategy. 

Social media is all about being authentic and creating a community with those who are following your business page. With Instagram Reels, the fun and fast ways of captivating them can be even easier with authentic content.

A great example of content that is not authentic content is stock photos. This is difficult because it is hard to get enough photos to utilize time and time again for social media marketing, but at the same time, it provides the convenience of not worrying about all those photos. 

They can come across as a misrepresentation of your company, and most people know a stock photo when they see one. 

Creating authentic content is one of the latest Instagram trends that companies can find themselves possibly using for the long term! 

Ready to get started? Here is an Instagram Reels tutorial featuring how to post, where to post, and what to keep an eye out for from Later.com. 

Once you have started the preliminary research or want to get your social media marketing strategies up and running, contact our company today!