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If you’re looking to harness the power of your Instagram posts for promotional purposes, the 「Boost Post」 feature is your go-to tool.
This article delves into the intricacies of Instagram’s 「Boost Post」 – an advertising function, guiding you through its operational procedures, highlighting its benefits, and underscoring key considerations for optimal use. It’s an indispensable guide for social media managers in corporate settings and for individual entrepreneurs who prioritize social media in their business strategy. Dive in for valuable insights!
Instagram’s Advertising Feature Unveiled: Understanding 「Boost Post」
「Boost Post」 refers to the feature that allows you to advertise previously posted photos and videos. Unlike before, where your content was limited to your followers or those who stumbled upon your profile through searches, this tool empowers you to reach a defined target audience. It’s a game-changer for making your promotions more focused and effective than ever!
However, it’s important to note that Boost Post is only available for business accounts. If you’re currently using a personal account, you won’t be able to access this feature. Therefore, you’ll need to switch to a business account in advance to take advantage of this functionality.
Additionally, utilizing Boost Post requires a certain amount of advertising budget. The system is designed for you to set the ‘amount you wish to spend per day’. It’s advisable to decide on this budget in advance to effectively manage your promotions.
Reference：Use Ad tools to boost an Instagram post｜Instagram Help Center – Facebook
What’s the Difference from Instagram Advertising？
The primary difference between Boost Post and standard Instagram advertising lies in the 「ease of operation」.
Starting off, the hallmark of Boost Post, which is 「the ability to turn past photos and videos into advertisements」, is also a feature of Instagram advertising. Thus, when leveraging existing posts for promotional purposes, the operational effort is quite comparable. However, the scenario changes when you’re crafting advertising materials from the ground up for Instagram ads – this not only involves additional production costs but also demands more time and effort. This aspect makes Instagram advertising typically more labor-intensive than using Boost Post.
Another key difference lies in the 「scope of target setting」.
While it’s possible to set a target audience in Boost Post, Instagram advertising offers a more granular level of customization. Specifically, with Boost Post, you can set parameters such as gender, age, location, and interests. However, Instagram ads take it a step further by allowing targeting based on users’ past behaviors. Therefore, if you’re looking to fine-tune your advertising target, utilizing Instagram advertising would be the better choice.
Mastering the Usage Procedures of Boost Post
The steps for using Boost Post are as follows.
1. Setting Up a Business Account
To reiterate, first, you need to set up a business account. By setting up, it doesn’t mean creating a new account from scratch; rather, you switch your existing account to a business account.
1. Go to your profile and tap 
2. Tap 
3. Tap Preferences.
4. Tap Switch to professional account.
5. Tap Continue.
6. Select a Category for your business and tap Done.
2. Choosing the Post You Want to Advertise
Next, select the post you want to advertise. Choosing content from your previous posts that received particularly good responses from users is likely to ensure effective promotion as an advertisement.
3. Selecting Your Objective
When you tap 「Boost Post」 located at the bottom right of the post you wish to advertise, you will be directed to a screen to select your objective. Choose from 「Visit your profile」, 「Visit your website」, or 「Message you」, based on what aligns with your company’s goals.
For example, if you aim to broaden the awareness of your company or brand on Instagram, selecting ‘Increase Profile Visits’ is recommended!
4. Setting Up a Custom Audience
Next, set up the audience you want to reach with your advertisement. Since you can freely choose the location, age, gender, and interests, base your decision on the target demographic you aim to reach with your product or service.
Additionally, Instagram offers an 「Suggested audience」 option where it targets users similar to your followers. This can be particularly useful if you don’t have a clear target demographic in mind yet.
5. Setting the Budget and Duration
Finally, set your budget and the duration for which the advertisement will run. The minimum budget is $1, while the maximum is $1000. The duration can be as short as one day or as long as 30 days.
Once you set your budget and duration, the system automatically calculates the ‘Estimated Reach’ (how many people you can reach), making it advisable to adjust these settings while keeping an eye on that number.
The Benefits of Using 「Boost Post」 to Advertise on Instagram
The benefits of using Boost Post for advertising include the following.
Saving Effort in Ad Creation
When starting advertising from scratch, it can be time-consuming to create images and videos. In contrast, when promoting your existing posts, you can use them as materials for your advertisements, significantly reducing the effort required for ad production! This can ultimately lead to a reduction in advertising production costs.
Utilizing High-Engagement Posts for Promotion
Due to the feature that allows past posts to be used as advertisements, you can advertise posts that received good responses from users.
With traditional advertising, you have to wait some time after launching an ad to see its effectiveness. Also, there is a continuous need to explore what kind of ads resonate with users.
In the case of advertising posts, however, you can put out ads knowing how users have reacted, allowing you to somewhat predict the potential effectiveness. Additionally, there’s no need to search for ads that resonate with users, making management easier.
Enhancing Engagement
As previously mentioned, when advertising posts, it’s possible to tailor your ads based on specific demographics such as location, age, gender, and interests. This effectively means 「being able to deliver your ads to a particular target audience」.
For instance, suppose a pasta restaurant in Harajuku decides to advertise a post about their highly recommended menu. They set their target audience as 「Women in their 20s in Tokyo who are interested in gourmet food」. In this scenario, the advertisement reaches only those users who are likely to show interest in the restaurant’s post, thereby naturally increasing the potential for engagement. This approach offers significant benefits for businesses, not only in terms of increasing foot traffic but also in enhancing brand awareness.
Enhancing Account and Brand Recognition
By utilizing the promotion of posts, you can reach users who are likely to be interested in your company’s posts. This approach allows you to increase awareness among users who were previously unaware of your account or brand.
Getting potential customers to recognize and understand 「there is such a shop (or business)」can not only lead to store visits and purchases but also serve as a catalyst for further enhancing brand recognition through word-of-mouth. Consequently, this approach can facilitate the acquisition of new customers.
High Cost-Effectiveness Expected
Advertising posts can be utilized from as low as $1 in advertising expenses. Moreover, as mentioned earlier, it’s possible to reduce the cost of creating advertisements. Additionally, if you advertise posts that have received positive responses from users, you can somewhat predict the promotional effectiveness, which may also help to minimize the costs associated with evaluating the effectiveness.
Given these factors, advertising posts are expected to offer high cost-effectiveness! This represents a significant advantage for SNS managers who aim to 「minimize the expenses associated with ad placements」.
Does Using 「Boost Post」 Get Noticed? Key Points to Be Aware Of
It is important to be cautious not to overuse boost post.
Advertisements created through Boost Post are, of course, designed to be immediately recognizable as ads.
It’s important to acknowledge that many users have a negative perception of advertisements. Therefore, overusing Boost Post, despite its convenience, can result in multiple ads from your company appearing on a user’s timeline. This overexposure might lead users to develop a negative image of your company. Such a scenario could hinder not just the increase in Instagram engagement but also make it challenging to translate this into purchases or store visits.
To avoid such situations, it’s advisable to use Boost Post moderately and only at strategic times!
How to Enhance the Effectiveness of 「Boost Post」?
So, how can you further enhance the effectiveness of post promotion? Below, we introduce four key points that you should keep in mind.
1. Optimize Your Profile
Users who see your ads may become curious about 「which account is posting this ad?’」or 「what kind of company is behind it?」 and may visit your profile. If they find your profile lacking information, it can lead to disappointment and miss the opportunity to deepen brand awareness. To avoid this, it’s crucial to ensure that necessary information is clearly stated in your profile and that it is well-organized and visually appealing, especially when using post promotion!
2. Use Popular Posts for Promotion
In post promotion, it’s advisable to use especially popular posts (those with high engagement) as advertisements. Posts with a lot of likes and comments indicate a high level of interest and engagement among many users. Utilizing these for your ads can lead to more satisfactory responses.
3. Minimize the Advertising Feel
Posts that strongly feel like advertisements, such as those using free stock images, might not get attention even if they reach the intended audience. This could render your promotional efforts futile. Therefore, it is recommended to use posts for promotion that have as little advertising feel as possible to avoid this issue.
For instance, posts that demonstrate the practicality of a product or compile use cases of a service are good choices. By using posts that can spark interest, resonate, or evoke empathy in your target audience as ads, they are more likely to be viewed and engaged with.
4. Consistently Conduct Testing and Analysis
When using boost post, it’s important to first conduct tests and analyses. Specifically, this involves testing the advertisements and analyzing aspects like 「which messages attracted the target audience’s interest」 and 「which designs are more likely to be clicked (or tapped)」. By doing this, you can use post promotion more effectively and more easily achieve the benefits mentioned above.
Let’s Expand Your Reach by Utilizing 「Boost Post」!
Using Instagram’s advertising feature 「Boost Post」, you can easily create ads and further expand your reach. This is hugely effective in increasing brand awareness and potential customer base, making the promotional impact significant! Be sure to take advantage of this opportunity.
Additionally, after using a post for promotion, it’s crucial to check the changes in profile visits, engagement with other posts, and traffic to external sites. This is because the objectives of delivering ads include 「enhancing the awareness of your account or brand」 and 「acquiring followers」, and it’s necessary to review the data to see if these goals are being met.
Therefore, I’d like to recommend the Instagram-specific management tool 「Slooooth」, which supports everything from analysis and report generation to scheduled posting! It allows you to quickly check detailed data about your account and posts, and since it retains past data, you can also analyze by comparing with previous figures. Moreover, just 1 click and a 5-minute wait is all it takes to complete a report, so there’s no need to compile the data yourself.
Slooooth is currently offering a free trial! You can use the PRO plan, normally priced at $69 per month, for free. Be sure to take advantage of this opportunity to try it out.
