Branding doesn’t stop at your website! Oh no. Your branding should be anywhere and everywhere you have a presence for your business! A brand that is cohesive across all of the platforms can help you attract the right followers, increase your brand’s awareness, and, ultimately, grow your business. And one of the best places to show off your brand is on your Instagram feed.

Like a website, you only have a few seconds to make a great first impression when your potential customer lands on your Instagram profile. So let’s make it count! In this post, I want to give you my best tips on how to carry your branding into your Instagram feed so you can have a cohesive brand strategy for this social platform and impress your audience when they land on your account!

Use Your Branding Board

I’ll go ahead and get this tip out of the way. If you have a branded color palette, textures, fonts, and imaging styles on your website, these need to show up on your Instagram feed tool. If you make graphics for your Instagram, include your branding elements! 

Sticking to your branding board will instantly make your Instagram profile recognizable, especially if your audience is hopping from one platform to another. Do you see why your branding needs to be consistent across all your platforms!?

Bonus: if you want to learn more about how to make your brand stand out from the crowd, you can read about the top characteristics of a well-designed brand here.

Show Off Your Personality (but stay professional)

Too many Instagram profiles are rocking their on-brand, professional and value-driven posts, but they are severely lacking personality. I’ll be totally honest with you: an Instagram account that doesn’t have any personality diminishes your opportunity to fully resonate with your audience. 

This disconnect usually happens because business owners are trying to balance their personal Insta account (you know, the one that your comment-happy aunt knows about) and their business Insta account as two separate profiles. 

Blending the two into one account will help bring your branding full circle. Your audience wants to know the face behind the brand! This is how you create a stronger connection with your people – by letting them get to know YOU!

Pro tip: while you do want to show off your personality (which should naturally match your branding), you also want to provide valuable knowledge about the business you are running. So keep this balanced within your feed.

Highlight Your Brand Values & Brand Identity

What do you care about the most? If you have values that influence your business, share these with your audience. People want to back brands and businesses that stand for something. Are you all about women’s empowerment and support women small business owners? Highlight that! Does a percentage of your revenue go towards a charity you care about? Highlight it!

If there is a reason behind what you are passionate about and why you started your business – share it! If your audience shares your values, you are only further strengthening your connection and relationship with them. 

Pro tip: It might help to define 3-5 pillars that highlight your brand’s identity. This can be your brand values, your brand’s personality, or anything that your brand is known for.

Share Your Brand Story

Why did you start your business? What got you to where you are now? People want to know what your story is. Sharing your brand story builds trust, keeps you top of mind, and establishes a community of followers that are here with you for the long haul because they are invested in YOU.

Give your audience a deeper understanding of your brand with every new story you share. If you are thinking you don’t have a story to share – you definitely do! If you donate a percentage of your revenue to a charity, share why you chose that charity and what it means to you. That’s a great story.

Your audience wants to understand your journey and how you got to where you are. They want to know why you are passionate about what you do. Sharing your brand story makes you more relatable and forms a connection through your messaging. And I promise, you have a story to share.

Create a Style Guide

Deciding on a style guide for your Instagram feed beforehand will save you SO much time in the future when it comes to your content creation. Once you know how you want your feed to look, it becomes easier to create and curate the graphics and images to match.

• What media will you be posting on your feed? Graphics? Use your branding elements, colors, fonts, and features if you have them! 
• Are you using images (you definitely should)? Decide what filters you will use because they help keep your images aesthetically pleasing and on-brand. 
• What about videos? Illustrations? Make sure they go with your branding style so your brand can truly come to life in a cohesive way. 

Implementing These Tips

When you’ve implemented these tips into your Instagram feed, started posting with a plan, and developed a content calendar, your branding for your Instagram feed will start working FOR your business.

Consistently in your feed will produce an aesthetically cohesive and completely on-brand profile that will grow your account and truly connect with your target audience. What more could you want, right?

Have questions? Contact me! Or if you want to get started on your branding, I would love to help you create a stunning look for your business! Just book a Discovery Call with me to chat.

If you still aren’t sure if you need a brand designer or should DIY it – check out this post to help you make your decision!