By Samantha Bielawski
One of my favorite social networks to scroll through is Instagram. I do a lot of scrolling through the app to get ideas for training, art, and decoration (I am one of those people who are obsessed with Halloween). Instagram is a photo and video sharing app that was launched in 2010 by Kevin Systrom. The main focus of the app was to feature photographs taken on mobile devices. One of the cool things that make Instagram a useful tool for marketing for companies is how easy consumers can help promote products.
The type of marketing I see directly on Instagram is promotions and sales advertisements. If you go on to tap on those promotions or ads it takes you to the Instagram page for that company and usually has a link to the website for easy access to their products. As there is direct marketing there is also indirect marketing in hashtags and tagging companies in Instagram posts. When people receive new products that they are excited about they will take pictures of the product, the effect of the product, or the product in use. This is free marketing in a way and can help companies to see the satisfaction of their products.
Like most positive media there can be bad media but depending on how the company handles the situation can make or break the company. There was an ad a while back that I came across and the company was having a going out of business sale. I saw a comment on the post by a past customer that said something along the lines that the product was poor quality and not as advertised. Even though the company was going out of business this could have been an example of why, customer receives product, customer posts how the product quality is poor. The company never responded to the consumer about their comment on the photo.
Resources
Blystone, D. (2020, June 17). The Story of Instagram: The Rise of the # 1 Photo-Sharing Application. Retrieved July 12, 2020, from https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/102615/story-instagram-rise-1-photo0sharing-app.asp
Sam Bielawski 