We last spoke about the Instagram Shopping feature and guided you through the process of creating your product catalog and applying for it on Instagram. This time, we’re talking shop – more precisely, how to make shoppable Instagram posts and stories.
One thing that most people who own an e-commerce brand might find difficult is getting those awesome followers to become even more awesome and buy stuff from your shop.
By now, you either want to set up your Instagram Shopping or you already have it want more results. So today we’re teaching you how to do just that.
- Is Instagram Shopping really worth it?
- Shoppable Instagram Posts – What are they?
- Things you need to know about shoppable posts
- What your feed and shop will look like
- How to link Shopify to your Instagram shop
- Let's not forget about your stories
- Useful information about shoppable Instagram content
- You're done!
Is Instagram Shopping really worth it?
A huge portion of users follow at least one brand. To be precise, roughly 85% of them do.
Instagram is one of the most populated social platforms out there, and it is of their interest to get revenue from shops that sell on the platform.
About 200 million Instagram users check out shoppable posts monthly! Shoppable stories are even better, as most users get interested in a brand after checking their cool stories.
Above all, Instagram’s shopping integration is awesome because it is easy to use for customers, they buy your products from within the Instagram app. This also means users get no time to think twice about their decision while switching to another platform or website. As a result, they make more impulsive purchases.
Shoppable Instagram Posts – What are they?
You probably tagged someone in a post before. When you do, if you tap the picture, you’ll see small tags containing the user’s Instagram handle.
Shoppable posts are the same, but instead of people, you’re tagging your products. Your products are listed on the Facebook product catalog, you can then post photos on Instagram and list their prices on the post itself.
Let’s consider what the customer will experience after your shoppable Instagram is up and running.
Anyone who visits your page sees a white icon indicating that your image or story has a shoppable product. The customer can bring up a pop-up window containing the product’s name and pricing.
The user will then tap the tag to get more information about the products and go to checkout.
Things you need to know about shoppable posts
As long as you sell physical products, you can apply for Instagram Shopping, however, there are a few guidelines you should read. Before you start tagging your products, check out the policies for Instagram and Facebook e-commerce.
The list of prohibited content is below:
- Human exploitation and sexual services
- Anything that violates Facebook’s Community Standards
- Ingestible supplements
- Jobs
- Medical and healthcare products
- Misleading, deceptive, or offensive
- No item for sale
- Prescription products, drugs, and drug paraphernalia
- Products with overtly sexualized positioning
- Recalled products
- Services
- Stolen goods
- Subscriptions and digital products
- Third-party infringement
- Tobacco products and related paraphernalia
- Weapons, ammunition, and explosives
- Adult products
- Alcohol
- Animals
- Body parts or fluids
- Digital media and electronic devices
- Discrimination
- Documents, currency, and financial instruments
- Gambling
- Hazardous goods and materials
Your business is most likely not related to any of the above, but just in case, we listed that for you.
Be sure to also check Instagram’s full guide to Shopping.
If you are good through all that, then you can set up Instagram Shopping.
What your feed and shop will look like
Once you have the shop up and running, users will see a “View Shop” button, which will then show your entire catalog to them.
You can also create specific sections on the Facebook catalog manager. Those look something like this example from Converse’s Instagram shop:
Your shoppable posts will shop up to users who follow you or to potential customers via the use of ads. Those will look like the post below, also by Converse.
Once a client selects a product, depending on the setup done by the seller, they are able to buy from the website or directly from Instagram.
How to link Shopify to your Instagram shop
If you use Shopify, it is possible to import products from there. You’ll have to sync your product catalog, then just put your products in front of the right audience, and track it all from your Shopify dashboard.
- From your Shopify admin, click Facebook sales channel > Overview.
- Click Set up to start in the Instagram Shopping section.
- Connect the required Facebook accounts to the Facebook sales channel.
- Review and accept the terms and conditions, then click Request approval.
It may take 24-48 hours for Facebook to review your products.
Note that this works if you’re on the Shopify Basic plan or above.
Let’s not forget about your stories
We talked about setting up shop in the previous article, and now we covered shoppable posts, but it doesn’t end there.
Shoppable stories will be a big part of your revenue as most users will interact with stories if they see something cool and well made.
All brands can tag physical products that are listed in their Facebook catalog or from other e-commerce platforms as we’ve covered with Shopify. This is done by adding stickers to your story.
- Tap the “+” icon on the top right of your Instagram homepage and select Story. Alternatively, you can swipe right and create from there.
- Select a photo or video to upload to your story.
- Select the product sticker from the sticker tray.
- Select the collection, storefront or product(s) from your catalog that you want to feature.
- Tap Done.
- Move the shopping sticker to where you want it to appear on your story.
Note: The style of the shopping sticker can be changed by tapping the sticker.
- Tap Send To and select your audience.
- Tap Share.
Useful information about shoppable Instagram content
Insights
Anyone creating Instagram shoppable posts and stories will also have access to Insights as you would with any Instagram content that is posted.
This includes the usual report on total views and who viewed the post or story, as well as product views, the number of times each follower tapped a product tag, and total clicks on each tag.
Posts have a maximum number of tags
Each post to your feed can feature up to five items. Stories can only have one product sticker at a time.
Can you make everything shoppable?
Well, yes. Any content you post, be that a story featuring a video or image, a post to your feed, or a story reshare can be tagged with your products!
You’re done!
To sum up, you are now on your way to master Instagram shopping and increase your sales.
We hope that your brand prospers and we’ll keep on bringing even more content to help you conquer the market jungle.
Be sure to check out Nitreo if you are looking for a safe and easy way to grow your audience and reach even more people!
Red is the content creator for this blog, working directly with the Nitreo team, he aims to help clients and Instagram users to optimize their content and metrics. He is also a photographer obsessed with urban photography and portraits, so you can expect a few posts about Instagram photography from time to time as well.
Red has worked as a Portuguese translator and interpreter for over 7 years, he also felt really weird writing this bio in the third person.