Communicating your social impact to Instagram audiences can be tough, especially when social media trends and demographics are constantly changing
As a CSR Leader and internal changemaker, you may be juggling many hats in the HR or community realms. But you may not be a social media expert or even involved in your company’s current social media strategy at all.
Because Corporate Social Responsibility often falls into the HR and employee programs departments, marketing and social media are often left out of the strategy or executed by someone without a ton of social media experience.
While we all may have personal social media accounts, each social media platform comes with its own ever-changing handbook of needed expertise, and mastering the rules and staying up to date with updates is a full-time job.
Most companies, by now, have taken to embracing social media as a modern-day necessity in their marketing approach because of its numerous benefits. We’ll save you the google search and summarize those quickly for you before we jump in.
DIRECT BENEFITS OF SOCIAL MEDIA FOR COMPANIES
- Direct access to consumers
- Direct engagement and interactions with a network of targeted consumers
- Easy to access and affordable targeted advertising opportunities
- Actionable, specific data metrics on advertising
- Increased brand awareness
- Higher conversion rates
THE IMPACT OF GEN Z ON YOUR TARGET MARKET
The future of the workforce lies within the Gen Z generation (currently ages 5-24). Gen Z is now the first generation to see the iPhone as a requirement to function in the world instead of a luxury.
Therefore, this generation’s connection to their community and brands is more direct through social media apps than ever before.
Take a look at this data from Business Insider that examines what social media platforms Gen Z uses most frequently.
At Good Impact Network, we understand the at times confusing and complex strategy that goes into social media marketing. We’ve broken down the need-to-know analytics for Instagram, as well as how to maximize your brand awareness and marketing potential on the platform.
CORPORATE PARTNERSHIP INSTAGRAM TACTICS
Before you dive into optimizing your Instagram strategy, you need to plan with your social impact strategy at the forefront.
Your social impact strategy is inherently part of your business strategy.
Whether you’re leveraging your impact metrics to customers and investors or just seeking to implement more messaging about your programs into your communication strategy, thinking about your social impact goals when creating an Instagram strategy is essential.
As you analyze your current reach and audience demographics, ask yourself this: What are my current or future corporate partners’ audiences interested in? What do they want to see?
Thinking about how to leverage your partners’ audiences to engage more with your own content starts with brainstorming ways the two of you can collaborate on content creation.
Posting about upcoming volunteer opportunities, your partner’s cool impact programs or initiatives, and personable introductions to team members are great examples of engaging content that will increase your organization’s visibility on social media and strengthen your partnership in the process.
INSTAGRAM DEMOGRAPHICS
Instagram is by far the most widely used social media platform today. Even if you’re already feeling confident about your current social media strategy, it’s important to check in with who is using each social media platform most frequently to pinpoint who exactly is seeing and engaging with your content.
Social media demographics help us indicate if your target audience is in alignment with who is active on your brand’s Instagram page.
According to an article by Forbes,
“CSR does not just reflect goodwill; it reflects an understanding that millennials want companies with CEOs who express political opinions (44%, according to a study by Shandwick) and hold positions on social issues such as immigration and diversity (47%). Generation Z (those born in the mid-1990s) are now entering the labour market, earning and spending money. They prefer companies that oppose poverty and support green policies and human rights – and they will choose these companies.”
Forbes
With such a young, relatively urban, and socially aware market of users, it’s vital for your brand to adapt to the desires, values, and needs of these Instagram users.
HOW AND WHY PEOPLE USE INSTAGRAM
Young consumers are using Instagram in new and compelling ways. Many use the platform as a means of escapism, to mindlessly scroll and take a retreat from their day-to-day lives. Since the platform is image and video-based, users are able to engage without reading too much or using too much brainpower.
More recently, studies have shown that young people are using the platform to construct, alter, and manage their identities online.
Your brand also has this opportunity to construct and develop your own brand identity that will resonate with your audience and help maintain brand awareness, creating a recognizable voice and personality online.
Instagram is also used as a method to share political, social, environmental, or other beliefs as we’ve seen with shareable posts regarding the BLM movement, COVID-19 graphics, or other posts that are easy to engage with and repost on Instagram stories.
Brands that are able to adapt to these trends and create content that resonates with their consumers get more traction on their feeds.
More shares = more visibility and engagement
CONTENT BEST PRACTICES
Content on Instagram can and must vary based on your brand’s mission.
A valuable tool in creating content is making personal graphics using Canva or any other graphic design tool. Mind Body Green (a wellness publication) does this superbly by creating easy-to-read graphics to supply quick, digestible information to their followers.
USING HASHTAGS
According to Later.com, “A post with at least one Instagram hashtag averages 12.6% more engagement than posts without a hashtag.” It’s definitely worth developing your own hashtag strategy for your brand to grow.
Using branded or campaign hashtags created by your company can foster an easily trackable community of consumers. By creating a hashtag unique to your company or campaign, your followers have a place to find and engage with your business’ content.
We hope this blog post has helped you understand how to share your company’s social impact effectively on Instagram.
There are many considerations when it comes to the different demographics of social media platforms. Now that you know the basics, go forth and build a strategy that drives engagement and brand awareness around your company’s impact. The only way to learn what works is to get started!
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