On Monday 14 May, The Industry hosted an Upping Your Instagram Game Masterclass at W London featuring a leading line-up of speakers who shared how brands and PR can increase their following, customer engagement, build their brand story, align with influencers and make money all through Instagram. Speakers included Founder of MLPR and Co-founder of Social Paradise, Marie Louise Pumfrey; blogger and founder of influencer marketing agency One Roof Social, Anna Hart and Chief Marketing Officer of Launchmetrics, Alison Levy. 

Alison Levy - Chief Marketing Officer of Launchmetrics Alison shared how influencers are changing the way brands plan their marketing mix with the latest Launchmetrics report The State of Influencer Marketing. Key figures from the report include:

• 80% of professionals in fashion, luxury and cosmetics activated campaigns with influencers in 2017 - A 25% increase from 2016
• 98.5% of professionals say sample loans and gifting is still the best way to connect with influencers
• 36% of marketers prefer Instagram, compared to 99% of influencers, when developing relationships
• 85% of influencers preferred sponsored content as a method of collaboration with brands
• 63% of influencers expect to be monetarily compensated for working with a brand  

Marie Louise Pumfrey - Co-founder of Social Paradise and Founder of MLPR Marie Louise shared her top tips on how to optimise Instagram as a valuable marketing tool and effectively use it for business. Marie's tips included: 

• Identifying your niche – growing is about knowing your audience, focus on their hobbies, posts and what they do. Identify 15 - 20 key accounts of the type of audience you want to connect with.

• Use your biography and bio-link wisely – your bio should identify your audience's pains and how you take that away; it must be more about them than you.

• Think of your Instagram as Google - it's a search engine. Optimise your posts with: Captions – captions should be relatable and inclusive. Talk about what's in your picture at the top of your post and invite users in. Calls to action sending users to your bio link should be mentioned in your second sentence and no later. Hashtags – get strategic with your hashtags. Do your research and create a library relevant to your target market in order to be at the top of your niche's hashtag. Follow the top 5 hashtags in your niche. Locations – users can follow hashtags so it's important to tag your location in not only posts but also InstaStories in order to maximize exposure.  

Anna Hart - Influencer and Founder of One Roof Social A leading Instagram influencer in her own right and founder of influencer marketing agency One Roof Social, Anna Hart shared advice on how to collaborate effectively with influencers and how to work within the ASA (Advertising Standards Agency) regulations. Key points Anna covered were:

• Starting a new relationship with an influencer should be organic - PRs and brands approaching influencers shouldn't send generic emails and instead should take the time to learn about the personality of the influencer.
• PRs and brands shouldn't base influencer partnerships on appearances - they should do research in order to determine whether the influencer and their following line up with the brand. Check that their general audience lines up with your target demographic. 
• It's not an influencer's responsibility to sell products, it's the brand's - whilst influencers may put time into creating content for brands, the brands must also ensure that their content is up to scratch. 

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