Top Tips For A Great Instagram Page

Instagram – How to make your page “pop”

Take Great Photos

We know this one may seem like a bit of a no brainer, but you’d be surprised at how many images are posted to social media that don’t look great!

Instagram is a visual tool and the images you use should reflect your salon and services – if you post low quality images then potential clients will assume that your services are also of a lower quality and move onto a salon with great visuals and storytelling. You are selling the client an idea of themselves and who they aspire to be.

Whether you are taking the images yourself or using images that your stylists take, you need to have a clear set of rules for your Instagram photos.

• Take images in a 1080x1080 (square) frame
• Utilise flattering lighting – purchase a ring light for the salon or clip on ring lights for mobile phones
• Take images in the same spot of the salon if you can
• Take before and after images

“The Grid”

Define your grid – Are you going to post images of hair only, are you going to have a backing to your images in your salon colour scheme? Are you alternating between hair and beauty images?

Your Instagram page will be the first impression of your salon when a potential client clicks onto your profile. We recommend thinking of your grid as a square of 9 amazing images. Those images should work together whether as a sea of blonde balayage or bright nail colours alongside creative hair colour.

The best way to ensure that your grid looks great is to schedule your posts. This allows you to plan how your 9 squares will look and the message that you want to convey to your clients. Taking the time to sit down with your images and decide which ones make the cut (excuse the pun!) will allow you to create a beautiful grid of the images that showcase your salon.

Post Regularly

You may have 15 fantastic images one week and then be too busy for a couple of weeks to post. Your clients want to see consistency.

To ensure that your salon stays in the feed of your potential clients (and on the discover page!) you need to post regularly. How that looks for your salon is up to you but we would recommend posting at least 3 times per week on set days – although posting daily is preferable.

By scheduling your posts using a publishing tool or the Meta Business Suite (Facebook Creator Studio), you can guarantee that your posts will appear at the right times, in front of the right people.

Add Contact Information

Your Instagram profile is a window to gaining more clients, so it is essential that they know how to contact you. Always include your salon website in your bio (this makes it easier to add a call to action “click the link in the bio for more information”) and if possible telephone and email address details. You can use DMs if you feel that you will be checking them regularly but we would not recommend this if you wont be checking daily – clients who don’t get responses will go elsewhere! You can set up auto responders for DMs – “Thank you for reaching out, we are not taking bookings via DM at this time, please contact the salon via the link in our bio to book”.

Captions

The hard work doesn’t end when you’ve chosen the perfect picture. The caption of your post is where you can give a voice to that visual content.

A good Instagram caption explains what the photo is about, tells the user to take action, or cracks a joke that makes your content all the more entertaining! Got a stylist who is great at hair puns? Use that in a caption to grab attention and make the user smile.

Always, always, ALWAYS include a call to action in your caption, such as “click the link in our bio” or “double tap if you love this hair colour”. Help your potential clients to engage with you by inviting them to do so! Use emojis that are relevant to help your captions stand out or to highlight points.

If in doubt, keep it brief and check your spelling and grammar! Rogue apostrophes and poor spelling can turn a customer away from even the most stunning images.

TAG, TAG, TAG

Ensure that you are found by the right clients and companies by tagging. Add a geo tag to all of your posts so that potential clients know where you are. If you have used supplier products in your post, such as Olaplex or GHD tools, tag the companies! Many big name suppliers will share your posts to their own feeds if you have tagged them in amazing images – increasing your reach across the platform.

#HASHTAGS

Using relevant hashtags is another important step in following Instagram best practices to help you grow your following on Instagram.

Hashtags help you reach a larger audience by improving visibility. When users search for hashtags on Instagram, they will find all of the content that has been tagged with that particular hashtag.

The general rule with hashtags on Instagram is to not overdo it. You want to make sure that any hashtags you use on a post are relevant to the content and your audience.

Also, you want to use hashtags that have an audience on Instagram. For instance, using a hashtag that only a few people are looking at will not help you reach more users.

Research the hashtags to use on a monthly basis as well as having staple hashtags such as #balayage