If you’re reading this you’re either in 1 of the two categories. You’re either 1) looking to grow more followers and build deeper relationships with your existing clientele. Or 2) You want to brand yourself as an established barber, or barbershop and want to leverage Instagram to get bring in more customers and walkins to your shop.
Wherever you are on your journey, these steps will put you in the right direction! So let’s start with the essentials, and that’s optimizing your Instagram Profile Page!
So let’s use this checklist to make sure your Profile is on par with the best!
Username
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- Now this might sound obvious, but you won’t believe how many people butcher their own brands by having a spammy or unoriginal username. What I mean is, you don’t want to have a username that looks like, @MikeJ2345 or Mike_da_barber_1234. Usernames with a bunch of random numbers or crazy characters just isn’t a clean look. Doesn’t look professional. This is where you’ll have to be creative, because every day that passes, more and more usernames are being taken.
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- If you have a personal brand and you’d like to use your actual name or a pen name, but it’s already taken, try adding phrases like “iam, “mynameis, im” so it reads, @iammikejoseph = I AM MIKE JOSEPH”. Like I said, be creative 🙂
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- If you own a barbershop and your barbershop is already taken, then you might really need to get creative. Let’s say for example your barbershop name is New Image Barbershop. However, @NewImageBarbershop is already taken. You should then create a username like, @NewImageBarbers or @NewImageBarbershops (adding an ‘s’ is perfect if you have or plan on opening multiple locations in the future)
Profile Picture
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- Photo must be 180px by 180px in size. Your profile picture should be clear and represent who you are. For example, if you’re a local barbershop you’re profile picture should be a picture of your business logo, or the chairs inside your barbershop.
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- If you’re a solo barber, it should be a clear high def photo of your face.
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- Remember, your Instagram profile picture is a small photo, so adding a full body picture, or a picture of your store front might not be ideal on the eyes. Remember, you have to think from the consumer’s perspective, no one is going to want to squint at your profile picture.
Insert name of your brand
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- This is pretty self explanatory, but I see a lot of people make this mistake by leaving it blank, or adding something irrelevant. This is great for SEO, so adding either your business name or title of what you do would be perfect. For example, my username could be @MikeDJoseph but my Instagram Page name could be “Mike The Barber”. Or, if you have a barbershop, you could put “Boston’s Best Barbershop”
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- So if anyone is searching for “Barber, Boston, Barbershop” my profile would be most likely to show up on the search results.
Bio
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- Now you’re only allowed to use 150 characters here, so make sure what you’re putting here counts! What I mean is, this is your chance to showcase your business and positioning. Make sure the description you add is SEO friendly, meaning, make sure it’s relevant to your audience. For example, if you own a Barbershop, don’t put up a random quote. Instead, describe what you do and what audience you serve. “We’re X Barbershop and we serve professionals, young and old in the New England Area”. This is your chance to speak to your audience, take advantage of it!
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- Your IG Bio is also good for linking other Instagram accounts to as well, especially if you’re trying to grow multiple accounts within the same niche. Or if you want to showcase some of your high profile clients that you’re working with. For example, if you cut celebrities or professional athletes you might want to include that in your bio.
Location
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- This is imperative especially if you’re trying to bring in local clients. You want to make it as easy as possible for your audience to find you. By adding your location you’ll pop up quicker in the search results in Instagram.
Website Link
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- This is where you get to drive traffic!!! If you don’t have at least 10k followers on Instagram, you can’t add any links to your Instagram profile, so take advantage of this real estate. Especially if you’re taking appointments online or if your shop sells products online.
Story Highlights
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- This can be used for a few different purposes. You can use this as a means to drive traffic to your other social media accounts. For example the cover photo for the highlight can be a picture of the YouTube Icon, and when people click to view that story it will link out to your YouTube Channel (must have 10k+ followers), or it will showcase your YouTube username for people to easily find you.
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- You should treat your Story Highlights almost as landing pages, each with their own purpose. For Example, you might have one highlight titled, “Testimonials” and it will showcase all the testimonials your barbershop has. Whereas another highlight can be titled, “BTS” or “Behind The Scenes”, this is where you get to show what happens when the cameras aren’t rolling and give your audience an inside look at your day to day operations.
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- You can also use Story Highlights to showcase your most engaging stories, polls, etc. You want to make sure their captivating, as you won’t be able to make another first impression again!
Now that you understand how to setup your Instagram Profile you should be able to take full advantage of Instagram’s advertising platform. For any questions or concerns reach out to us here, info@visualmediamkt.com. If you’re curious about the benefits of advertising online or would like to get an idea of what Facebook & Instagram can do for your business, take a look at some of the results we’ve been able to generate our clients here, http://bit.ly/VMResults.
