Instagram Marketing: Powerful Messaging To Expand Brand Awareness
Instagram, the social networking app designed to share photos and videos, is not only for Gen Z to share selfies and food pics. Your audience is there, too!
Social media offers contractors the ability to inexpensively extend their brand awareness to a thriving and increasingly valuable platform. Here are 8 reasons why service contractors should use Instagram for finding new leads:
1. Instagram Has a Huge Audience
Based on current monthly active users, Instagram boasts the title of the 3rd most popular social media platform. A DreamGrow article reports only Facebook, Instagram’s parent company, and Youtube, owned by Google, have more users:
Social Media Platform
|
Monthly Active Users
|
Facebook |
2.96 billion |
YouTube |
2.2 billion |
Instagram |
2 billion |
Of Instagram’s 2 billion active users, 71% are under the age of 35 while 28%--or 560 million--are 35 and over, according to Hootsuite. Many of those 35 and over are the homeowners or soon-to-be homeowners you’re targeting. Each of them view Instagram content on a regular basis.
As social media continues to become increasingly more pervasive in local contractor marketing, business owners stand to grow their customer base -- or at minimum increase top-of-mind awareness -- through Instagram.

2. Get A Jumpstart Marketing to Millennials, New Home Owners
We've already talked about how you'll need to adjust your approach to reach millennials.
This generation is more tech-savvy than previous generations and they respond well to Instagram. Nearly 60% of Millennials, those born 1977 to 1995, use Instagram!
That is a lot of buying power. They’re your new homeowners and will inevitably need repairs and maintenance. Establish brand loyalty with them as soon as you can to increase your long-term success.
3. The Explore Page Offers Impactful Visibility
A post making it to the Explore page can be a big win for any business’s visibility. This places your brand in front of individuals who are already interested in content similar to yours. The Explore page, for those not privy to Instagram’s search structure, is the browsing function wherein users search for hashtags and categories to find posts.
This page uses an algorithm to tailor content to users based on their activity. Posts that have seen particularly higher engagement levels are more likely to make it to this page.
You can increase the likelihood of being included on the Explore page by actively engaging your followers through post commentary and hashtags.
4. Easily Use Targeted Advertising
With a business profile, targeted advertising can be done in 5 ways:
- Videos
- Photos
- Canvas Story Ads
- Story Ads
- Carousels
These ads are woven into Stories and Feeds. You can also use Facebook Ad Manager to make ads on Instagram. This tool can help target your audience based on your Facebook and website user data with the help of Facebook Pixel.
5. Mobile Use Only Increases
Instagram is built for a mobile experience. As mobile usage increases, it’s a safe bet to predict that the Instagram audience will increase with it.