If you use Instagram to advertise your products then you know that the holiday season is a crucial time for sales through the app. You may use shop capabilities already but Instagram’s guides are an underutilized feature many businesses don’t take advantage of. Shoppable guides are a great way to attract attention from potential customers and increase sales with a set-it-and-forget-it approach. Allowing customers to shop through the Instagram app instead of having to click through to make their purchase increases their likelihood of checking out with the cart they may fill up while scrolling.
The first step to creating a shoppable gift guide is to create eye-catching images of your products. This is something you may already have done for your website so you’re already in a good position to create your guide.
Once you’ve got your product images ready to go, open the Instagram app and click the plus sign in the top right corner–where you already create your posts from. Scroll down to the “Guide” button and select the icon that looks like an open newspaper. Then you’ll be asked to choose the type of guide you want to make. Click on the “products” button.
If you already have a shop on Instagram, you can add them here and write the content for your guide recommending your products and filling in any details you want customers’ to know about as they browse. If you do not have your Instagram shop set up yet, this must be done first to make your holiday gift guide shoppable. You must have a business account to create a shop and once you do, the process is as simple as adding tags that show the price. To add shopping tags, you’ll need to link your Instagram account to a store, such as Shopify or BigCommerce. The shopping tags allow customers to click directly on an item in your posts and be taken to the product page.
Finally, it’s time to promote your shoppable gift guide. Post about it on all of your social media channels, not just Instagram, to encourage followers to share it with their friends. You can also reach out to influencers and ask them to feature your guide on their own accounts or collaborate with other businesses to create guides that feature complimentary products. Collaboration will increase your reach and hopefully result in more sales.
Creating a gift guide on Instagram is a great way to interact with your customers and increase sales during the holiday season–or any time you want to mix up the type of content you’re sharing and make shopping easier. With the right promotion strategy, you can create an eye-catching gift guide that will drive more customers to your Instagram shop.