If you are not using Instagram to generate leads right now, you are missing out on the easiest and best leads on social media. Especially if you sell to people who are 35 and under. Instagram is by far my favorite social media platform and it’s quickly becoming everyone else’s too. 

Here’s some of the reasons social media users are flocking to Instagram at a record breaking speed. First, there are less trolls. Second, there is a lot less political stories and posts. Third, the algorithm is still user friendly. It’s a fun site that’s not based on arguing, complaining and calling other people out. Because of these reasons and more, people are flocking to IG in droves. 

Many reports show people are leaving Facebook for good and using Instagram as their social media site of choice. I predicted that by 2019 IG will be the #1 social media platform used by Americans. As more and more angry old people complain on Facebook, many of us are focusing our time on IG. 

Now, let’s talk about lead generation on Instagram. You may not think you can get leads from IG and if that’s what you think, you are thinking wrong. Instagram is the easiest place to get leads from right now. Why? Because it’s wide open. The competition is on Google and Facebook, which leaves IG wide open for the pillaging of well qualified leads. 

I remember when I started my social media management company back in 2012. People told me I couldn’t get leads from Facebook. I see the same trend taking place today on Instagram today. People don’t believe it’s a good place to get leads, but they believe wrong. IG is the best place to get free leads online right now. When no one else is competing, it’s easier to win. Remember that. 

Enough about the why, let’s talk about the how. I’m going to give you 5 ways to generate leads from IG stories. Now, let me give some of you IG rookies some intel on how it works. Instagram has 2 main newsfeeds. The pictures and videos feed aka the main feed and then the storied feed. The stories are the circles at the top of the IG app with quick 15 second or less videos and pictures. They are the live look into a business or persons daily life and they expire in 24 hours. For the purpose of this article, we are talking about 5 ways to get leads from IG stories. 

First, you need to capture at least 3-5 different stories per day. They can be pictures or short videos, but you need to update the app 3-5 times a day in order to build your frequency up to ensure you show up as one of the top stories. If you post one story a week it’s guaranteed you won;’t get any exposure, therefore no one will become a lead. Frequency is a huge factor in how instagram shows other people stories in the feed. 

Second, you need to make a call to action in the stories. So for every 5th or 6th story, you need to call the viewer to action. This means saying something like “swipe up for more” or “go to the link in my profile for more info” The swipe up function is for people with 10,000 or more followers only, right now. So if you don’t have 10,000 followers you must send them to the link in your bio on your IG profile page. Calls to action are crucial. You can also say “send me a DM to talk about it” and handle the selling process in the DM.

Third, make sure you use hashtags (#) in your stories. Do some research and figure out what hashtags your prospects are likely searching for and using on IG and then use them in your stories. Hashtags are searchable in IG stories just like the rest of the app. If you use the same hashtags in your main feed and profile as you do your stories, you can link them up and when they search your story hashtag, they will find your other posts too which will create more familiarity with your audience. 

Fourth, create a poll or a emoji scale to engage your audience. Ask them a question using the poll or slider. In order to use this, when you take a pic or make a video, simply hit the peeling smiley face at the top of the story, then add the poll or slider. IG tracks your results and reveals them when you swipe down later on the story you posted. From there, reach out to the people who took your poll or slid your emoji and start a conversation with them to engage them. 

Finally, when you watch other people’s stories, reply to them and engage them. IG users don’t get as many likes, comments or replies as the average FB user does so, it’s easier to get their attention and start a conversation. When you engage someone, they are more likely to still associate IG with good vibes and reply to you than they do on FB and other social media sites. 

The bottom line here, is that I just gave you a 5 step process to get as many leads as you want from Instagram, but you must put in the work. The way I’ve built a 100,000+ following on Insta, is from doing the work. I post daily, engage people, send messages and follow everything I just told you to do. The majority of my social media time is now spent on Instagram and I love the site. I’ve closed 100s of 1000s of dollars of business this year alone from IG stories. I’m telling you now is the time to get in and start, before too many people catch on and flood it like they did Facebook.

One thing I can suggest though, is to take the info you get from Instagram and add it to a CRM. Leads are meant to be stored, followed up with and data on them stored. For example, if someone gives you their name, email and phone number in the DM or on a comment, add that shit to your CRM with a note to follow up on IG. 

The future of sales is all about social media interactions and data collection. When you marry those 2 things with powerful closing skills you become unstoppable. If you have ZERO tech skills it’s still easy to create websites that collect data and generate leads for you to talk to and add to your CRM for follow up. Sign up for www.phonesites.com and you can have one of these sites set up in a matter of 5 minutes and ready to go, even if you have never done anything online before. Sign up today and get to collecting leads.