How To Use Instagram to Grow your Yoga or Pilates Studio

Owning a Yoga or Pilates studio can certainly be a rewarding experience. But growing your studio can be a bit of a challenge when you don't know how to leverage your social platforms to grow your audience and attract new customers.

For this reason, we're going to show you how to use Instagram to effectively start attracting people to your studio today. 

Why is Social Media Important?

Today, social media is central to a business's marketing strategy. It is one of the easiest ways to tap into new markets, increase your brand's visibility, stay connected with potential customers, and keep your business at the forefront of your customers' minds. 

Businesses that don't have a social presence are easily missing out on new customers because consumers expect businesses to have a strong presence online as more consumers are making purchasing decisions right through the internet. Social media helps you establish your brand's presence and it improves your overall credibility. With that said, here's how you can use Instagram to grow your studio. 

Instagram Ads 

Instagram ads is a marketing method that allows you to pay for sponsored content in order to reach a larger audience. With that said, these ads are the perfect opportunity to leverage your social media to grow your Yoga or Pilates studio. 

Sponsored ads help businesses increase visibility, improve engagement and conversions, and reach their target market. Many business owners fail to meet their social media goals because they don't take advantage of the tools available for businesses to grow and connect with their ideal customers. 

However, tools such as Instagram ads give you the opportunity to create campaigns for prospects at all stages of the sales funnel. In fact, Instagram users are more than willing to engage with sponsored content. Yotpo found that ad recall on Instagram is 2.8x higher than any other ad recall on other social networks.

Strategy

Instagram ads are a great investment. However, businesses should first research their ideal customers' interests to create ads that are relevant and effective. 

Instagram Stories

Another excellent feature of Instagram is Instagram stories. Stories were originally created in 2016 for friends and family to share more of their lives with their loved ones. However, Instagram stories have become a powerhouse for businesses to connect and engage with audiences on a more personal level. 

Businesses can post content and share new products and services while keeping their Instagram feed clean. Additionally, this gives businesses the opportunity to be more personal with their audience by going live. 

If you own a Yoga or Pilates Studio, you can leverage Instagram stories by giving a snippet of some of your sessions, talk about the benefits of your services or share new services and products that are coming to your studio. 

Strategy

Instagram stories allow you more working room when it comes to the kind of content you can post. But it's a good idea to know what kind of content is important for your business and what works best for this platform. For instance, you may find that Instagram stories are better suited for behind-the-scenes videos of your studio whereas more complex information is best as a traditionally filmed video.

Video Content 

Video marketing is unarguably one of the best ways to boost audience engagement. Videos build trust and credibility, encourages social shares, and helps improve conversion rates. In fact, 85% of all internet users in the United States watched online content monthly in 2018. Additionally, the demand for video content is increasing with 54% of consumers wanting to see more video content on their feed. 

That's not all though, video content is great for your business because it gives you the opportunity to share in-depth, complex information that can't be conveyed in a single image. 

For this reason, business owners need to integrate video content into their marketing strategy, and Instagram is the perfect place to do it. Instagram stories aren't the only place for business owners to post video content though, IGTV and posting to your feed are both excellent ways to grow new customers. 

IGTV

Instagram TV is a standalone app by Instagram that allows you to post longer video content compared to what is allowed on the Instagram app.

Posting to your Feed

There are two popular ways to post to your feed:

• Upload prerecorded Instagram video
• Auto publish your video content for a specific time  

Strategy

Once again, before posting video content to your Instagram page, businesses should map out what kind of content they plan to create. Additionally, you should consider how often you want to post and be mindful of what a realistic goal is for you. Consistency is important in business and if your audience doesn't see consistency in your content, this will send a bad message.

Hashtags

Hashtags may appear to be a small part of your marketing strategy but they are actually crucial in not only connecting with different audiences but driving more engagement and brand awareness. What's even better is that hashtags are completely free to use.

If you want to grow your studio, then engagement needs to be a top priority on your social media platforms. Without engagement, it'll be difficult to grow your customers. However, a business that knows how to keep their audience engaged is more likely to receive real results that impact their business in a positive way. 

One study showed that Instagram posts that included hashtags received a 70% increase in engagement as compared to hashtag-free posts. This is because hashtags help categorise content for your audience. With that said, these hashtags help users find posts that are relevant to their interests, which means they are more likely to interact with your post. Not using hashtags would make it difficult for businesses to target their audience with precision.

Strategy

Business owners should create hashtags with their intended audience in mind. For instance, if you are posting content about yoga poses then hashtags such as #yogaposes or #beginneryoga would be an excellent way to categorise your content for the intended audience.

Next Steps

Growing your Yoga or Pilates studio doesn't have to be a difficult task. All it takes is to understand how to navigate today's market by leveraging social media. Instagram continues to play an integral role in businesses attracting and retaining new customers, which is why every business owner should integrate Instagram into their marketing strategy.

If you own a Yoga or Pilates business and are in need of insurance, sign up today to become a member and access competitively-priced insurance.