Instagram Advertising Campaign Tips: Ad Formats and Your Best Ads

Looking for Instagram advertising campaign tips to grow your brand, website traffic, sales leads, and conversions? You’ve come to the right place! Last few weeks, you’ve learned in our blog posts how to create an Instagram business account, build a strategy, optimize your business profile, share high-quality content, grow your Instagram fanbase, and measure your performance on Instagram. Today, you’ll learn how to run an Instagram advertising campaign to stand out from your competitors on Instagram.

According to Instagram, 60% of people said they discovered new products on Instagram in 2015. There was an 80% increase in time spent watching video on Instagram, and 200 million+ Instagrammers visit at least one business profile daily in 2017.

Ad Formats

The first Instagram advertising campaign tip is to find out what types of Instagram ads you want to run.

1. Image ads appear in square, landscape, or vertical. Your images should incorporate your brand logo, icon, and color, tell a story about your business, and look professional.
2. Video ads in Feed can be up to 60 minutes, but shorter videos are more effective. They are best uploaded in square (1:1), although other formats work.
3. Carousel ads feature up to 10 images or videos in square or vertical on Feed and Stories. They may contain a call-to-action button or swipe up link to your website. They are used to showcase products, and tell a brand story.
4. Stories ads are full-screen vertical image, video or carousel ads with a call-to-action at the bottom as a swipe-up link. They have higher engagement than in-feed ads. Here are some best practices for Stories and Stories ads guidelines.
5. In-Stream video ads are best uploaded in full-screen vertical videos up to 1 minute long. Here are some in-stream video ads guidelines and aspect ratio restrictions. On October 5 2021, Instagram combined IGTV and feed videos into Instagram Video.
6. Reels ads only support full-screen vertical assets. Here are some Reels ads guidelines.
7. Explore ads appear between organic content. Instagram Explore shows Instagram content based on a given person’s interest. It shows posts from non-follower accounts. Here are some Explore ads guidelines.
8. A collection shop ad includes an image or video followed by 3 product images. It only supports single-image or carousel and appear as square. They are used for discovering, browsing, and purchasing products and services. Here are some collection ads guidelines.

Your Best Ads

Our second Instagram advertising campaign tip is to choose what Instagram ads best suit your business. First, you need to find out what your ad campaign goals are, such as sales, app downloads, brand awareness, website traffic, new product promo, etc. For example, use collection ads if your goal is to sell.

Secondly, you need to find out who your target audience is including their habits and behaviors. For example, use Stories, Reels, or in-stream video ads if most of your target audience are video lovers.

Thirdly, you need to find out what types of your organic Instagram posts are the most engaging. For example, use image or carousel ads if most of your existing audience consume your image posts.

You can use Facebook Ads Manager to test different ad formats to find out which one performs best before running your Instagram advertising campaign.

Conclusion

Now you’ve learned some Instagram advertising campaign tips like ad format and what types of Instagram ads suit your business. Next week, we’ll continue with our Instagram Advertising Campaign Tips Guide.

Further Reading

• Facebook Marketing Part 5: How to Advertise on Facebook
• Instagram Marketing Strategy Guide Part 3: Instagram Marketing Performance Metrics
• YouTube Marketing Strategy Part 5: YouTube Video Advertising Campaigns
• Instagram Marketing Strategy Guide Part 1
• Advertising Agency Business Website
• Find a Web Designer