Setting Up Your Profile

Professional Profile Practices

Your Instagram profile is both your first impression to potential customers and new visitors as well as your consistent branded message to your existing audience. Your profile should be recognizable to your audience and showcase the value you provide as a business. See Figure 2-1.

FIGURE 2-1: The Instagram profile consists of these standard components.

Instagram profiles are comprised of the following six components: username, profile photo, name, bio, website URL, and business address (optional). In addition, profiles that have upgraded to a business account have contact buttons. We talk more about all these elements in the coming sections.

Your profile should be consistent with the branding and messaging you use on other online marketing platforms, but it should also align with the styling and formatting that appeals to Instagram users. Note too that you need to format your profile according to Instagram's formatting and character restrictions. These limits and restrictions are discussed in more detail later in this chapter.

Choosing a name and username for your business

Your name and username are two of the most important components of your Instagram profile because they are the only two searchable criteria of your profile. When users type a keyword or name in the search field on Instagram, the app looks at only the username and name fields of accounts to determine if an account is relevant to that search query.

The username is the string of characters at the top of profile. The name is the bold text below the profile photo. If you want your business to be found by a keyword or phrase, be sure to include it in either the name or username for your account.

Choosing the best username

You must select a username when you set up a new Instagram account. Your Instagram username is how you are recognized on Instagram: All activity, from the content you post to how you engage with others, is associated with your username. The username is at the top of the profile, as shown in Figure 2-2.

FIGURE 2-2: The username of your account is listed at the top of your profile.

Your username is the component of your Instagram URL that defines your account. It's delineated with the @ symbol when referring to you as a user. The URL for your Instagram account is

http://instagram.com/yourusername

When you interact on Instagram, the username appears as

yourusername

An Instagram username is limited to 30 characters and must contain only letters, numbers, periods, and underscores. You can't include symbols or other punctuation marks as a part of your username.

Choose a username that represents your brand, is recognizable, and, if possible, distinguishes what you do. Your username might be simply your business name or an adapted version of your business name, such as @louboutinworld, instead of Christian Louboutin. Or you might also include a word or two that describes your business industry or niche to further define who you are, such as @yorkelee_prints.

Choosing a username that is different than your business name may confuse Instagram users as to whether or not your account is the official account for your business. It's best to keep variations as minimal as possible to avoid confusion.

During the registration portion of your Instagram account, you're prompted to select your username. If the username you selected is available, a check mark will appear. If someone is using that username, an X will appear in the username field. Keep selecting alternatives until you find an available username.

Usernames are provided on a first-come basis. If you’re signing up for a new Instagram account using the web version, Instagram will populate an available username for you. Delete this username and type one that represents your brand. If the username you want to use is unavailable, you can use alternative options by adding periods or underscores to the username, by using abbreviations, or by adding another word.

There is little you can do to have an existing username transferred to your account if it's in use or was previously used by another account. If another account is using your registered trademark as its username, visit https://help.instagram.com/101826856646059 for information on how to file a claim of trademark violation.

It's good practice to read your username objectively before finalizing it. When you combine more than one word into a single username, without spacing, the arrangement of the letters may read differently or inappropriately to others. For example, @yourusername might be read as “You Ruse R Name” instead of “Your Username.” When this is the case, consider adding periods or underscores to separate the words within the username as follows: @your.username or @your_username.

After you select a username, all content linking to your profile is associated with the username's URL. If you want to change the username at some point, your URL would change and you would need to update all backlinks and links to that profile accordingly. This is why it's best to choose the right username when setting up your profile.

If you do want to change your username, follow these easy steps:

Go to your profile on Instagram on either your mobile device or your computer.
Tap or click Edit Profile.
In the Username field, type the new username.
Save your changes.

To do so, tap the check mark, Done, Save, or Submit button (depending on the device you're using).

Choosing the best name

Your Instagram name is visible only when someone visits your profile directly. The name appears in bold below the profile photo (refer to Figure 2-2).

Your profile will perform better in searches and look more professional if the name and username are different. Having a name that's different from your username provides double the opportunity for keywords and searchable criteria in the Instagram app. Power users on Instagram take the time to craft good username and name components.

Unlike your username, which is one word, your name should be in proper sentence structure with capital letters and spacing. Your name (like your username) is limited to 30 characters, including spaces.

You can use your actual name or business name as your name on Instagram. Or you may choose to use an abbreviation or a commonly recognized description of your business. For example, if your business is a pizza restaurant called Farm Fresh Pizza, your username might be farm.fresh.pizza and your name might be Best Pizzeria in Boston.

You can be found in more searches on Instagram if you include a keyword or phrase in your name or username or both. If you didn't put a defining keyword in your username, you should include one in your name field, in addition to your actual name. For example, in Figure 2-2, Rachel added the keywords Plant Based and Fitness to her name field.

The name on your profile is not tied to your URL or other defining aspects of Instagram, so you can change it at any time. Consider adding or changing keywords, as necessary, to appeal to your target audience on Instagram.

If you want to change your name, do the following:

Go to your Instagram profile, and tap or click Edit Profile.
In the Name field, type the new name.
Save your changes.

To do so, tap the check mark, Done, Save, or Submit button (depending on the device you're using).

Choosing a profile photo that attracts customers

The profile photo on your account, as well as your username, is associated with all your activity. When you post anything to Instagram or engage with other users in any way, your profile photo is visible.

Your profile photo should represent your brand and be recognizable to others. If your company is actively using other social media platforms, its Instagram profile photo should be the same as the one used on other platforms. In this way, you create cohesion across your online media and assure your customers that they found the correct account when searching for you.

Profile photos on Instagram are cropped to a circle, so your photo should fit properly within that crop. Don't use a logo or an image that loses valuable content when cropped to a circle.

The profile photo on your profile page appears larger than anywhere else on Instagram. When interacting with others, the profile photo is a thumbnail (small) version. Choose an image that isn't too busy, overwhelming, or cluttered with text, because the image will become difficult to decipher as a thumbnail.

The best profile photos are high resolution so that they have a clear object of focus, contain a simple background, and don't pixelate. (In a pixelated photo, a low-resolution image is enlarged too much and the individual square pixels become obvious, making the image blurry.)

Writing a Bio That Draws in Followers

Your Instagram bio is a short description on your profile that tells people about your business. This description is similar to a 30-second elevator speech and is how you convince new visitors to follow your account.

Most people will read your bio only the first time they visit your profile. Your bio is the first impression you give to new viewers and should accurately convey the message you want to share.

Deciding what information to include

Before you start writing your bio, choose at least two or three key aspects of your business to highlight. These should be traits that will connect emotionally, in some way, with your ideal target audience, such as the examples shown in Figure 2-3.

FIGURE 2-3: Effective Instagram bios immediately convey value to the visitor.

You also need to determine the voice and style of your bio. If your brand is known for being humorous and witty, your Instagram bio should reflect that same style through words and relevant emojis. In contrast, if your brand is professional and classy, your bio should not be silly and humorous.

To market effectively on Instagram, you must know your target audience and how they're using Instagram. Your bio should be written in a way that connects with the people in that specific demographic. Determine the characteristics that you most want to connect with in that audience and write your bio accordingly. For example, in Figure 2-4, the target audience is people who want to learn about video marketing and how to create their own videos. The bio is written to appeal to that audience.

FIGURE 2-4: The Instagram bio for @owen.video is designed to appeal to people interested in video marketing.

The Instagram bio is limited to 150 characters, including spaces. The bio is designed to be one single paragraph of information, but you can use formatting techniques to add spaces and line breaks.

Because Instagram was designed to be used on a mobile device, it’s best to format your bio on a mobile device so that you retain the correct formatting and alignment. No matter what formatting you create, your bio on a desktop or computer device will always be one long paragraph spanning the width of the browser, unlike the vertical alignment seen on mobile devices.

Include the emojis and symbols on your device’s keyboard in your bio to create visual appeal and to better connect with your audience. To add emojis, you must open the emoji keyboard on your mobile device. An iOS user should tap the smiley face icon at the bottom of the keyboard. An Android user can tap the smiley face button to the left of the spacebar. (If you don't see a smiley face, tap and hold down on the microphone icon to display a pop-up menu, where you can select the smiley face icon.) Instagram is a visual platform, and having icons in the bio helps yours stand out from others. You have many emojis to choose from. If the traditional funny face and cartoonish emojis don't translate to your brand's style, use simple emoji symbols such as squares, diamonds, triangles, and arrows to add color and visual content without detracting from your professional style.

Hashtags aren't clickable in the Instagram bio on mobile devices, so including a hashtag in your bio description is irrelevant. The exception is if you have a unique branded hashtag that you want people to associate with your brand. For example, @sandiegophotos encourages followers to use the #MySDPhoto hashtag to have their photos showcased on their account (see Figure 2-5). They use this for branding purposes, because the hashtag is still not clickable. We talk all about using hashtags on Instagram in Chapter 8.

FIGURE 2-5: A hashtag in your Instagram bio can be helpful for branding but is not clickable.

Formatting your bio

You can edit or create your bio by tapping the Edit Profile button in your Instagram profile. In the Edit Profile screen, shown in Figure 2-6, go to the Bio field and insert the text for your bio. Save any changes when you're finished. Please note that Figure 2-6 shows the setup for a business profile.

FIGURE 2-6: Add your bio in the Edit Profile screen.

Android users can format a bio completely in Instagram. If you want to include line breaks and spacing, tap the Return or Enter key (on the keyboard of your mobile device) at the end of the line. Make sure that you don't have an extra space after the final character on the line and that the last character on the line is not an emoji. Otherwise, the breaks you inserted with the Return or Enter key will not appear in your published text.

iOS users can format a bio in Instagram, but line breaks will not be retained. Instead, it's best to open a note app on your device and use it to craft your bio description, including all formatting. Then copy the bio, open Instagram again, select Edit Profile, and paste the description in the Bio field. As with Android users, you must ensure that no extra space appears after the final character on the line and that the last character on the line is not an emoji.

Your bio can be edited and rewritten as often as you want. It's a best practice to review your bio every six months and verify that the information is still accurate and relevant. If something should be revised, go through the editing steps used to set up your initial bio to change the text.

If you run marketing campaigns or have seasonal content or promotions, you can update your bio to align with these events.

Using a call to action to drive website traffic

The last line of your bio should be a call to action (CTA) that directs visitors to click the URL listed below it. (We cover this URL setup in the next section.) The call to action should be clear and actionable but also specific to the action you're asking visitors to do.

Do not simply write Visit our website or Click below. Instead, use something like Get your free ebook here or Shop our new styles now. Include a down-arrow emoji at the end of the CTA that points to where the URL will appear in the bio (refer to the examples in Figure 2-3).

As with the rest of your bio, the CTA can be edited as often as you like. Experiment with different wording to determine which drives the best number of clicks to your website.

Choosing a website link that encourages clicks

The most effective way to generate website traffic from Instagram is to use the only clickable URL on the platform — the link in your bio.

You can maximize your website traffic by ensuring that the URL in your bio takes visitors to the exact page you're promoting. For example, if you're promoting an opportunity to sign up for your newsletter but the link goes to your website home page where there's no place to sign up, you'll lose potential registrants. In this case, you want the link to go directly to the website page where the signup form is located, making it easy for your Instagram audience to sign up quickly.

Your URL can be updated or changed as frequently as you like. You might have a default web page for your profile but change it to coincide with a promotion or campaign you're running on Instagram. After that campaign is complete, you can change the link back to your default.

To accurately track your Instagram traffic, you need to do more than upload a direct link to your website. If someone clicks the link in your bio from Instagram on the desktop, Google Analytics records it as referral traffic from Instagram. When someone taps the link in Instagram on a mobile device, a new browser is opened. Google Analytics doesn't properly track that traffic for you. Instead, it considers opening the new browser direct traffic, not social media referral traffic.

Although Google Analytics is tracking that traffic for you, it's categorizing it alongside all other direct traffic to your site, not as a click-through from Instagram. As a result, you may look at your website traffic and be convinced that Instagram is not driving any significant traffic, when it may be sending much more traffic than you're aware of.

To correct this, use a link shortener that provides trackable data on the number of clicks. The link shorteners Bitly, goo.gl, and Rebrandly are the most reliable and safe options. Each provides a data analysis of each link to allow you to track how many clicks you're generating.

To use a link shortener, follow these simple steps:

Find your long-form URL (the direct link from your website) and copy it.
Open the link shortener website of your choice.
Paste the long-form URL in the link shortener website.

The link shortener generates a short link.
Customize the short URL to match your branding or page.
Copy the short URL and paste it as your URL in your Instagram bio.

Most link shorteners generate a link with random letters and numbers, such as http://bit.ly/2X4y6. This doesn’t look professional, and visitors might find the link confusing or might question the link's validity. You can simply customize the link to reflect your brand. For example, if your long-form URL is http://jennstrends.com/blog, the short-form one might be http://bit.ly/JTBlog or http://bit.ly/JennsTrendsBlog.

Taking Advantage of a Business Profile Upgrade

In late 2016, Instagram introduced business profiles to Instagram. Before this feature rolled out, all profiles on Instagram looked identical. Now brands have the capability to stand out from regular accounts and can benefit from a variety of features available only to business profiles.

By upgrading to a business profile on Instagram, you get features such as the following:

Easy-to-access contact buttons that make it easy for your customers to email you, call you, or get directions to your location
An industry listing that informs visitors what you do as a business
In-app analytics to best monitor what is and isn’t working in your content strategy
The ability to boost posts from your Instagram profile and run ads on Instagram
The ability to manage your Instagram comments and engagement through your Facebook page

As mentioned, you are allowed only one clickable link (in your bio). The contact button feature means people can call or email you, providing you additional ways to connect directly with your customers and close more sales!

To upgrade to a business profile on Instagram, you must have a Facebook business page to which you can connect. Instagram advertising is managed through the Facebook Business Manager, and even if you don’t plan to run ads, Instagram requires you to connect to a Facebook business page.

You can connect only one Facebook page to one Instagram profile. If you manage multiple Instagram accounts and want to upgrade them all, they must each connect to a separate Facebook page.

Now that you've set up your Instagram account, as outlined in this chapter, you can easily upgrade your account to a business profile, following a few steps outlined next.

Connecting to a Facebook page

As mentioned, you need to have a Facebook business page if you want to upgrade to an Instagram business profile. Then you follow a few easy steps to connect your Instagram account to your Facebook business page and set up your contact information.

To upgrade your Instagram account to a business account, do the following:

Log in to Instagram on your mobile device, and tap Edit Profile.

The Edit Profile screen appears, as shown in Figure 2-7.
Select the Upgrade to Business Profile option or the Try Instagram Business Tools option.
Tap your way through the screens that highlight the value of business profiles.
When prompted, tap Continue to connect to a Facebook page.
Select your Facebook page.

If you manage only one Facebook page, that page is selected automatically. If you manage multiple Facebook pages, they will appear in the list of options. Select the page to which you want to connect.

Information from your Facebook page, including your email address, phone number, and location, is imported, as shown in Figure 2-8.

The contact info uploaded to the Instagram setup screen determines which contact buttons (Email, Phone, and Directions) appear on your profile. For example, if you don't include a phone number, the Call Contact button will not appear.
Update or add information as necessary.

For example, if your information does not populate a phone number but you would like to include the Call contact button, you can add your phone number to that field in the Contact Options screen.

You can edit this information at any time, in case you want to add or delete a contact option later.
Save your information.

Tap the check mark in the top-right corner of the Contact Options screen.

FIGURE 2-7: The Edit Profile screen has an option for upgrading to a business profile.

FIGURE 2-8: Edit your contact information to populate the contact buttons on your profile.

Your Instagram account is now set up as a business profile!

Navigating your business profile

Now that you've upgraded to a business profile, you'll see some new features on your profile, as shown in Figure 2-9.

FIGURE 2-9: Business profiles provide features not available to a regular Instagram account.

Business profile features allow you to make the most out of your Instagram account by tracking your account analytics, promoting your posts, and providing information to your audience about how to contact you:

The bar graph (in the top-right corner) is where you'll find your profile analytics. As you post content and build your audience, new information will be recorded in your analytics.
The Promote button allows you to create a paid advertising campaign based on content in your profile.
The industry tag associated with your Facebook page transfers over to your Instagram account and is listed in gray below your name.
The contact buttons you set up when upgrading your account appear on your profile, making it easy for your audience to contact you. (An Email contact button appears in Figure 2-9.)

After upgrading your account, your new business profile appears to people visiting your profile. If they're following you, they can tap the Message button to message you (via direct message) from your profile. They also see your contact buttons and industry listing. Figure 2-10 shows how a business profile looks to others.

FIGURE 2-10: Instagram users view your business profile with these added features.

Even though you have these additional features as a business profile, your profile characteristics, such as your username, name, bio, and URL, remain the same.