Advertisers have struggled to reach consumers via Instagram because they couldn’t use the Facebook Inc.-owned photo and video-sharing social network to drive traffic to their sites. Now they can.
Instagram is rolling out a new ad unit over the next few weeks called “carousel” ads that allows brands to include multiple images in a single ad. And, perhaps more significantly, those ads can include a Learn More button that links to a retailer’s website.
The new ad addresses feedback Instagram has heard: Brands want more tools to tell “complete stories around their brands” and a way for consumers to learn more after they’ve looked at a sponsored photo or video, an Instagram spokeswoman says.
Instagram compares carousel ads to multipage print campaigns in magazines, but with the added benefit of taking people to a website to learn more. For instance, a car company might share a car’s features in an ad’s slides and provide a link to learn more about the new model.
Carousel ads are the first ad unit Instagram has released that lets brands drive traffic to their sites, but visual analytics and marketing vendor Curalate in August launched Like2Buy, which works around Instagram’s limitations. When a shopper clicks on a Curalate Like2Buy retailer client’s profile page, she can bring up a gallery of Instagram photos that, when clicked, go to the item’s product page. Nordstrom Inc. and Charlotte Russe Inc. are among the merchants that use Like2Buy.
Charlotte Russe has found Like2Buy to be an effective way to boost sales; the conversion rate for shoppers clicking from Instagram outpaces the retailer’s average 1.2% conversion rate.
The introduction of clickable ads is a sign that Instagram is shifting away from a platform marketers can use for branding to one they can use to drive sales, says Pau Sabria, CEO and co-founder of visual analytics marketing vendor Olapic.
“Instagram’s monetization strategy has historically focused on brand lift and not a call to action, but they are clearly starting to experiment with new value propositions,” he says.