4 Kinds of Instagram Posts That Get Tons Of Likes and Comments

For many brands, Instagram is downright indispensable.

When used correctly, it can be a very powerful marketing tool.

This is especially true for brands that sell B2C products.

Apparel, accessories, travel, lifestyle brands, fitness — all of that stuff can see incredible engagement on Instagram.

There are a bunch of different types of posts that you can create for the platform.

What they have in common is that they revolve around visual content.

Instagram is a platform for sharing photos. Brands that thrive there tend to be those whose product lends itself to visual content.

But there are a bunch of creative options you can try out, even if you're not selling something like shoes or makeup.

Here are just a few interesting Instagram ideas from a recent Wishpond blog post.

The great thing about them is that you can adapt them for brands that aren't necessarily something with tons of visual content.

BEHIND THE SCENES

On Instagram, nobody wants to read your blog articles or learn about how you can address their consumer needs. In fact, unless you do it creatively, even a product launch is difficult to pull off with any success.

Instagram users want to see your personality. They want to see who you are as a company. They want to put a face to the name, so to speak.

Showing behind-the-scenes at your company is a great way to showcase your personality, as Microsoft shows us below:

[image source: Wishpond]
CURRENT EVENTS

A great way to increase Instagram engagement is to tap into what people are already thinking about.

This can be anything…

TGIF or “Boo, Monday!” – style posts

Well-known holidays (Christmas, Father's Day)

Lesser-known holidays (National Dog Day, National Hot Dog Day)

Events or conferences relevant to your target market (SXSW, ComicCon, E3, Content Marketing World, etc)

World events (big movie premier, for instance)

Tapping into what people are already thinking about is a great way to boost Instagram engagement, as Forever21 has done with Father's Day below:

[image source: Wishpond]
FUNNY CONTENT

A post idea which really hits home with the “entertainment” requirement I mentioned before is funny content – an opportunity for your business to get creative and make something which makes your Fans (and prospective fans) smile.

This example, from Vitamin Water, uses humor to appeal to their prospective fans and customers, effectively exposing a common social media trope:

[image source: Wishpond]
HASHTAG CONTEST

Contests, especially hashtag contests, make it easy for Instagram users to engage with your brand, and they incentivize them to do so.

Users submit their photo to your contest by adding a photo to Instagram and then tagging it with a campaign-specific hashtag.

This example from Starbucks also taps into a best practice – a long-running, draw-a-week structure:

[image source: Wishpond]