How do I Boost my Influencer Content on Instagram?

Its good news all round with the latest announcement from Instagram – you can now boost influencer content directly from the gram! We have long been beating the drum that brands need to follow through completely on their influencer campaigns by utilising influencer content for the wider marketing / PR strategy. This new feature ‘Branded Content Ads’ will make it even easier!

Given 50% of brands still say that influencer marketing lacks the visibility you get in other areas of marketing [Source:  Influencer Marketing Report], Branded Content Ads goes one step further into solving the difficult questions that arise such as influencer marketing ROI. Branded Content Ads will be available via ‘Paid Partnerships’ (the tool which auto signposts branded content). When the influencer posts, using this tool, they can adjust the setting ‘allow my business partner to boost’. This will allow the brand to push the post to their own feed – and boost the post to their chosen audience. What’s more, you’ll also have access to all of the standard reporting metrics, meaning you’ll be able to test content and measure its effectiveness accordingly.

“With branded content ads, businesses have an opportunity to tell their brand stories through creators’ voices, reach new audiences and measure impact.” [Source: Instagram]

In the coming weeks, branded content will be made available to all brands and advertisers on grid posts, with the Stories deployment to follow. With that in mind here is everything you’ll need to know to start boosting, measuring and reporting on your influencer content.

How to Boost Branded Content on Instagram

Firstly, you have to grant the necessary permissions to your content creators:

• Navigate to your Instagram settings > Business > Branded Content
• Turn on ‘Require Approvals’ > Approved accounts > search for your content creators then save.
• Once the Influencer has set their content live, they will need to opt in to allow you promote the post.

Read More: Everything You Need to Know About Instagram Influencers in 2019

The next stage I am guessing you’ll be rather familiar with, as it’s the exact same as boosting your own content via Facebook Ads manager.

• Go to Ads manager on your PC and create a new campaign, choosing your campaign and choose your campaign objectives (Reach, Brand Awareness, Video Views, Traffic or Engagement)
• As usual, select your target audience, but under ‘placements’ you’ll need to select ‘Edit Placements’ > Instagram feed.
• Continue setting your campaign budget and schedule
• At Ad level, navigate to ‘Use Existing Post’ to find your branded content > Select Post > Branded Content. All of your pre-approved branded content will live here.
• Once you’ve selected the post you’d like to promote, you’ll see a preview, then hit ‘confirm’.
• As usual, Facebook will still need to approve the post.

From here, you will be able to access insights into your posts, taking much of the guesswork out of influencer content performance. The new feature brings us one step closer to transparency in influencer marketing, whilst opening up influencers to new audiences. Instagram we salute!  

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Maeve Sugrue

I’m Marketing Director at ZINE where I am helping peers and customers who want to revolutionise their influencer marketing strategy. I love food, fitness and Min Pins.