Generating Leads With Instagram Stories: A Step By Step Guide

Instagram is popularly known as a social networking and photo sharing platform which is widely popular amongst the teens and young adults. We all see Instagram in that light. However, it is also a great platform for generating B2B leads.

Here are some of the statistics that will prove that you should start seeing Instagram as a lead generation platform.

• 80% of users follow at least one business on Instagram
• 75% of Instagram users take actions after visiting a post
• 72% saying they have made fashion, beauty or style-related purchases after seeing something on Instagram
• 60% of users say that they have learned about a product or service on the platform
• Instagram has more than 800 million monthly active users
• 200 million Instagram users actively visit business profile every day

Even separate Instagram features such as Instagram Stories gets more than 300 million daily active users. This means that if you focus on only this feature, you can still generate a lot of leads.

In order to do that, you will have to convince followers and influence their buying decision process but how?

Want to know how brands are using Instagram stories and converting followers into customers?

Here is how brands are using Instagram stories and kind of stories brands put out.

Is your Instagram post not getting user engagement? It is time to change or rethink your Instagram strategy.

How to Generate Leads with Instagram Stories?

1. Add Personality to Your Stories

The biggest advantage of Instagram stories is that you can personalize them according to your brand personality. Add a human touch to your Instagram stories because your target audience wants to see the human side of your brand.

Instagram audience want an experience, not informational content so your Instagram stories should be designed with that in mind. Apply the stickers and music to your Instagram stories to add individuality to your brand.

You can introduce your audience with your team and get everyone involved even the C-level executives. Your followers will think that they are a part of your company and will be more interested in buying from you because you are valuing them.

2. Make Popular Content a Regular Feature
Humans are driven by habits. When we like something, we want to see it again and again until we get bored of it. Would you like to see your favorite TV show again? Yes.

Would you like to read your favorite magazine again? Yes. The same rule applies to Instagram stories as well. Identify the type of content that is striking a chord with your target audience and make it a regular feature of your Instagram feed.

For instance, your target audience on Instagram engages with product demos. Make it an integral part of your Instagram strategy. This will help you win over loyal followers. The more they engage with your Instagram posts, the more chances you must convert them into B2B leads.

3. Share Purpose Driven Posts

If you want more engagement, leads and sales via Instagram, Sue B Zimmerman, an Instagram expert shares her formula for success. According to her,

• You should have a posting strategy that aligns with your brand
• Use relevant hashtags instead of popular ones
• Use geotags to boost user engagement
• Add a call to action

Here is a great example of how she does it herself:

For a daily dose of Instagram tips, follow her on The Instagram expert account.

4. Use Captions as your CTAs
As mentioned above, you must use a call to action to tell users what to do next and persuade them to take actions you want them to take. Unlike other social platforms, you need to a bit careful when using CTAs because going overboard with CTAs will cause more harm than good.

Instagram users like to stay on Instagram instead of going to other websites and platforms, but you also have to divert them to your website so how to do it: By mixing up your call to actions.

Instagram allows you to add more content to your caption, so you should include a call to action subtly in your caption. You can even add a mini blog just like this one.

5. Become a Thought Leader on Instagram
Instagram stories expire after 24 hours. This makes it an ideal choice for delivering thought leadership content. When you deliver short-lived thought leadership content via Instagram stories, your target audience will consider it as an exclusive experience.

Additionally, it creates a sense of urgency among them, forcing them to see your content as quickly as possible.

What type of content should you share to portray yourself as an industry thought leader? Share your experience; give useful advice and insights on trending industry topics and burning issues. You can also give a product demonstration and show how customers can benefit your products.

6. Use Videos
According to Constant Contact, you should use video extensively because 64% of customers are more likely to buy a product after watching a video about it. It is also one of the best ways to keep the audience engaged and help you build connections quickly. They went on to make this fact public by sharing a post about it.

Here is what that post looked like.

7. Create Your Own Sales Funnel For Instagram
Every Instagram user is different and belongs to a different stage in the buyer’s journey. You will find everyone from a teen searching for his or her favorite brand to a business owner searching for different brands or their products. Post Instagram content and stories for every stage of the sales funnel. Don’t let leads slip through the cracks in your sales funnel.

Create Instagram ads for every stage of the funnel. For the top of the funnel, focus on solving your industry problems and tell prospects about your company and how your company works.

For middle to bottom funnel, you should publish Instagram content that is comprehensive and focused towards your products and services. Highlight the benefits your customers would get after using your products and services.

8. Create a Clickable Instagram Feed
Social media marketing expert “Peg Fitzpatrick” specializes in Instagram marketing have a clever tip to generate B2B leads. She creates a clickable Instagram feed by using a tool known as Gallery Metrics and suggests you should do the same.

Here is one of her Instagram post:

Pay attention to Peg’s caption where it says, “Link in Bio” She retains the valid link for images like this by using the Gallery Metric tool.

9. Deliver Value
I saved the best one for the last. Lead by delivering value. This tip came from none other than Sue B Zimmerman, who is one of the top Instagram experts to follow for Instagram marketing.

She suggests that businesses should focus more on delivering value to customers instead of asking customers to turn on their notification or follow them. You can automatically convert profile visitors and followers into leads by constantly delivering value. Her Instagram post says it all.

Bonus: Generating More Leads With Content Marketing

Blogging is still the main avenue where B2B and B2C marketers get to generate leads. It is a fact that with blogging, B2B marketers get to generate more leads than those who do not.

Market Research

When there is something that is not yet widely known, the first thing to be done is to do extensive research and to study it thoroughly. Wise decisions are based on an in-depth analysis of the market.

By doing market research, you get to put your company in the center of your consumers. It is worth mentioning that market research is very important in doing content marketing for you to be able to generate leads.

Finding Commercial Keywords

How will you know that there are potential customers for your product?

It’s simple, find commercial keywords. With keywords, you get to know what your prospects are searching for. By looking for commercial keywords, you will know what your target audience are intending to buy. When you answer the question of your audience through high-quality content, you’re giving your business a chance to build up a more personal brand.

Create Landing Pages that Convert

If you are obsessed with conversion rate optimization, you will agree that as we already have established, not all of the landing pages are equal.

There are many of landing pages that are underperforming. These pages are not able to maximize their leads and convert them into customers.

As a marketer, your responsibility is understanding why you create or use a certain landing page. This is one of the things that you have to figure out first, and then you can move on to perfecting your landing page.

Let’s recap. Start off by creating an Instagram strategy for every stage of the buyer’s journey and have some purpose behind every post you publish on Instagram.

Add a human touch your Instagram posts so your audience can relate to it. Establish yourself as a thought leader and use video to grow your sales. Lastly, you should lead by constantly delivering value to your customers.

How do you generate leads through Instagram stories? Feel free to share it with us in the comments section below.