We’re going to be putting together a series of glossaries/guides to help you get your head around all the lingo, terminology and key phrases you may hear people use when talking about social media channels. Today’s glossary is all about Instagram! Many businesses know they should use Instagram but it can get confusing understanding all the aspects it holds. If you need more help with managing your accounts and creating content, get in touch with us but for now here’s what you need to know!
Grid
Your ‘grid’ is the space where all of your photos you upload appear, it’s also known as your profile. Your profile is laid out like a grid because it is a 3 image wide by x number of rows. When you upload a photo it appears on your grid. It’s worth looking at how your grid appears to viewers as this will be the first thing someone who stumbles across your profile will see. A nicely laid out, themed page can make the difference on engagements and likes.
Story
Your Instagram story is a 24 hour, live feed of images or video that are considered more casual, on the go and frequent compared to your grid photos. In a similar style to Snapchat and Facebook stories, these are portrait images or videos that appear on the top of your Instagram app in a little circle. It will show to your followers for only 24 hours only with each upload and it is a great place to share behind the scenes, updates, on the go imagery and news. It is one of the most effective ways to create conversations and share other content you are enjoying.
Captions
Captions are quite self explanatory but they are what go underneath your image uploads. Captions should be filled with information, a call to action or information that will encourage engagements and likes. Let your captions do the talking and avoid putting ‘words’ into your images.
Photos
When it comes to Instagram it is a photo and video only platform, it was primarily set up for photographers so treat it similarly. Let your business shine with actual photography, whether it’s a iPhone or actual camera photography, avoid using wordart where possible. Your images should be actual photographs, not stock images or word based if you want to increase engagements.
Hashtags
Hashtags on Instagram provide the biggest chance of engagement and reach. You will be able to use up to 30 hashtags on one post (either in the caption or the comments) so make sure you utilise this. Ideally, limit your hashtags in your comments and then put the bulk of them in the comments section. It keeps your captions looking neater and nicely formatted. We recommend keeping things local when it comes to hashtags, especially when you’re under 5000 followers. This is because you’ll want to drum up interest to your local business first and then expand organically. You’ll notice that big influencers and profiles won’t need to use hashtags when they have a big enough following.
Geotagging
Geo-tagging is placing a location against an image. On Instagram, you can tag a location of any kind be it local, country, regional or specific to a business address. This is useful for looking up profiles in your local area but also vital for any business that’s looking to target locally. It can be ideal for sharing your businesses address too to help make people aware of your location. Ensure you tag a location of some kind every time you upload a photo, it massively helps with engagement and reach – why wouldn’t you utilise it!
IGTV
Instagram TV is essentially Youtube for Instagram. You can upload portrait style videos that are more in-depth, educational or vlog style here. These are best being produced and edited rather than just a short upload like a mini social media video. Save your little 1-2 min videos for your story and produce a 5 minute plus video for IGTV.
A lot of the terminology is quite basic but you’ll always find different versions of explaining the same thing! Instagram is a great platform to use as a business – so get gramming!
