We are talking about the fastest-growing app of the moment. This app has an estimated 400 million monthly active users (worldwide), and of those users the estimated number of users in the U.S. is around 77.6 million. In 2018, there will be approximately 106.2 million users in the U.S.. These numbers are estimated results taken from both Instagram’s own reports and other news reports.

It’s a good idea to start thinking about how to use this app to promote your brand or to reach your market in a very unique way. Instagram is a mobile-based social network used to share videos and photos, mainly. With it you can increase the customer engagement and loyalty by creating an image of your brand the way you want to be seen by social media users.

You need to take into consideration certain tips and strategies to be more reachable:

1. Hashtags. They show your post outside the circle of your followers. They let you reach more markets or customers that weren’t aware of your company. You could use popular hashtags, trends, or the ones that are searched by most people on the app. You could also go the other way and use very detailed hashtags to reach the persons that search for a specific thing – something more focused on what you offer. You need to experiment with hashtags – maybe using from 1 to 10 on each post (see what works best for you).
2. Keep your Theme. Build an identity with eye-catching content. You shouldn’t take random pictures and post them. Build a theme around your product or brand (the way you want to be seen by your followers) rather than just bombard people with pictures of promos or photos of your product. Create an image that could be associated with your product and slowly sell your brand in an attractive way.
3. Frequency. Create a content calendar to maintain an active presence. This will depend on how you want to reach your followers. The recommendable thing to do is to post daily to get to your followers and have the opportunity to reach new ones. If you think that posting more often (like twice a day) is going to increase your followers, just try it out. Experiment with different options and see what fits your brand until you find the perfect amount of daily posting.
4. Build a community. It is a social platform so use it as such. You need to engage with people, involve yourself around the interests of your company. This could be through hashtags, liking others person’s pictures, or commenting.
5. Profile perfection. Make sure that your profile is in touch with the theme you choose for the brand and also make your description and profile image attractive enough. You can show links to your other social media pages or to your website. Consider creating a specific hashtag associated with your brand that you can use in your pictures to make it your own and for people to associate it with your company.
6. Captions. You can write 2,200-character captions to engage your customers by microblogging within your posts, sharing a story or giving them a full description of the moment you’re sharing with them. 
7. Tools. Use ICONOSQUARE, an app that allows you to access your account from your web browser and analyze the statistics of your posts on Instagram. Use SCHEDUGRAM to make a schedule of your posts in your account. INK361 offers a full service tool for viewing, scheduling and managing your posts. PIQORA will help you find things to attract an audience by showing them interesting posts.
8. Instagram adds. The app now allows you to advertise your business. You only need to create an ad on your Facebook account and pay for your business to reach more people through Instagram.
9. Post variety. Post user-submitted pictures of customers enjoying your products and/or services. Post some pictures of your business location, new products, images with positive comments, demos, a personal side of your day, holiday posts, etc..
    

Tell us what do you think of these strategies or add another tip to use Instagram in the comments below.