Stories.
They seem weird, but they’re one of the most powerful tools you can use to sell your services on Instagram, because they accomplish two of the most important priorities when marketing any product or service.
Top of mind awareness
Attention.
Top of mind is why all these big brands spend bajillions every year running what are, if you think about it, weird ads. Ads that don’t directly sell their services. The funny Old Spice commercials.
Or, Coke and their never-ending “fizz” commercials.
On and on.
It’s to keep reminding you about them and to associate their brand with positive emotions. Instagram stories work in a similar way. When you post to your story, it pushes toward the front of the line in your follower’s feed.
The more you post to your story…
The more you’ll stay toward the front…
And, have that same “top-of-mind” awareness.
But, Instagram stories have something that TV and radio don’t have. They also command attention. They’re only up for 24 hours AND, they only show for a few seconds before automatically flipping to the next item in your story.
So, you have to pay attention.
And, this isn’t theory.
Buffer did a research study on 15,000 Instagram stories from 200 top brands (one of the largest such studies to date) and found completion rates above 70%. In fact, even when an account had 20+ stories in its story feed…
The completion rates were still above 55-60%.
Remember, these are BRANDS…
So, businesses… not Aunt Peggy.
When’s the last time you paid that much attention to a TV ad?
Point is, this is a powerful marketing tool…
If you know how to use it.
Of course, most people on Instagram just shoot from the hip with all this, because they don’t have any kind of coherent strategy. The reality is, for most businesses and freelancers, they still really have no idea how to use social media for business.
They’re either soft-balling way too much…
With pictures of their kids or their lunch for that day (sigh)…
Or, just blatantly spamming sales pitches in every post.
Neither works all that well.
And, most seem to just give up after they put in a bunch of work and don’t see any benefit. And THEN, you have these gurus who call you a “sucker” because you gave up on it too quick.
Don’t you know?
You’re supposed to do this for 10 years before you expect to see any results.
Duh!
Uh, okay? :/
Aaaaaanyway…
This the problem I solve.
To end the confusion…
And, showing business owners how to market on social media…
Without screaming “BUY NOW!” 100 times every post…
Or, being terrified to even mention your business.
Specifically, I teach the strategy I discovered all the way back in the early days of MySpace to make the first sales I ever made online. And, I’ve use, to this day, on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc…
To power my 6-figure business.
In any case, it’s in the Social Media Marketing for Freelancers course over on SkillShare. Which you can get free access to here: https://johnmorrisonline.com/smm
Later,
John
