Everybody loves photos.

The world cannot get enough of snapping one photo after another. We are so addicted to taking photos that Yahoo! has predicted that as many as 880 billion photos will be taken in 2014 alone!

When talking about photos it is inevitable to talk about both Instagram and Facebook. According to Buzzfeed in 2013, every 60 seconds there are 208,300 photos uploaded to Facebook and 27,800 photos uploaded to Instagram.

Because photos are so engaging and Instagram and Facebook are great channels to share them, it is important for you to consider Instagram and Facebook in your marketing strategy.

Instagram: The Little App That Could

Put simply, Instagram is a photo app that is available for free from the iTunes App Store and Google Play. On Instagram, when you decide to follow a user those user’s photos will appear in your feed and you can press “Like” on any photo to let someone know that you admire their photography, or leave a comment. You can also create short 15-second videos.

The app is very popular and, According to Instagram, it reached 100 million users on April 2012. Given its ability to catch eyeballs, Facebook decided to acquire Instagram and learn how to improve its own photo features.

Marketing Opportunities for Businesses

It is all about engagement. If you have great content on Instagram, then your followers will like it, comment on it, and reshare it. You could leverage those engaging pictures and videos on your Instagram account and use them as paid ads on Facebook.

Remember that Facebook makes it really easy for you to either embed Instagram photos and videos, and that you can share Instagram items directly to Facebook from the app.

Based on the positive feedback that you got from Instagram users you can take that content to the next level on Facebook by promoting the post. Facebook provides useful guidelines on how to promote posts from your personal account or page.

Another alternative to paid advertising is to leverage your influential followers through creative ways.  A great example is 8 Hotels, a chain of boutique hotels around the world. This hotel company came up with a great way to reward its most influential Instagram followers: 1 free night for its Instagram followers that have over 10,000 followers. You can view 8 Hotel’s post here. The company used the Instagram theme to its fullest by naming one of its properties 1888, which is the year that Kodak released the first box and roll camera.

This hotel in Australia features a revolving digital mural of Instagram images, and a dedicated space to snap a photo of yourself as you check in. Over 140 photos are already tagged on Instagram with the hotel’s selected hashtag #1888hotel, and a single photo from popular YouTube star, tagged with the hotel’s hashtag and taken at the hotel, has received over 32,000 likes and 300 comments so far.

If you want to learn about how to use social media for your business or need help with your social media strategy, a free consultation with Seattle SEO Consultant about your web needs.