Understanding aspects of authentic content and aspirational material on Instagram

By Pete Campbell

As our world undergoes a digital evolution, consumers are increasingly becoming irritated by or rather immune to manipulative or self-serving and self-promotional content marketing standards (or techniques).

Contemporary surveys say that 70% of people think that content marketing is valuable and beneficial, but 30% believe this domain to be unreliable, misleading and biased. With digital audiences evolving with time and Generation Z forming the next line of consumers, they can more easily locate and debunk manipulative or false content.

• Experts refer to authentic content marketing as the new revolution in the world of marketing.
• It’s that content that tries to genuinely fit into your service and help its industry and readers sans manipulating its viewers.
• While the majority of businesses avoid openly obscure techniques, many brands step into the snare of unscrupulous, but legal, advertising techniques and plan just because everyone else in the circuit is practicing it.
• The most misleading content marketing tactics are common ones. These are sponsored content or native advertising, old statistics, and Instagram Pods and stock photos.
• Instagram Pods are inauthentic content marketing. These are promotional methods they have designed to break into the IG algorithm to hide a brand’s content from more people.
• Pods are specifically organized clusters of brands and businesses, who team up and manipulate the network’s algorithm.
• Pods drive fellow members into thinking that fake content is engaging.

Boosting your brand authenticity 

Always remember that authenticity comes at a high price. With such a crowded marketplace, an avalanche of branded information spoils modern consumers, propelling them not to trust firms that focus on the products.

So, to make your consumers purchase your products or services, you need to win their trust. If you want to be outstanding, authenticity is not a mere option anymore. Customers only look for authenticity. So, you need to think about your consumers first.

• To stay genuine and authentic, you need to comment and like on your potential or existing customers’ content, encouraging their material as they put more effort into the stuff.
• The next step is to leverage and use user-generated content. A hidden truth is customers don’t want professional pictures that have that ‘too good to be true’ tag.
• In fact, 75% of the time, they can underline the difference between brand-driven content and consumer-generated content.
• The solution is to bank on user-made content. Instagrammers upload over 80 million pictures daily according to Task Ant. Brands like GoPro and Starbucks publish something called UGC. It delivers great results.
• Do Live Stream to create a sense of engagement and urgency. Ephemeral or quickfire content is not a clickbait.
• It’s a trend, allowing marketers to keep their audience glued to the sets. More and more companies post stuff that vanished within one day to provide followers with urgent and interesting content sans spamming on their feed.
• So, going live has become too crucial. As a core part of the transient content, it builds a mood of urgency and belonging, and followers have a greater chance of joining your stream. They don’t want to skip something pivotal.
• Streaming enhances brand perception and favorability. It has thus become an integral part of your marketing program.
• When brands go live, they illustrate brand transparency, invariably building trust.
• Online shoppers don’t purchase products that don’t suit them. Hence, sellers must strive to avoid antagonizing people.
• It also helps customers understand what they can get from the products.
• Handling negative feedback is equally important. Running a corporate account on Instagram, it’s virtually impossible to avoid getting complaints, even if you have the best item ever.
• Nowadays, customers flock to channels where they can post negative feedback about an item and extract a response.

People don’t really bother much negative feedback or losing followers as they can buy real Instagram likes from reputable sites.

Hiccups with branded content 

Around 25% of young users think that brands influence their buying patterns or decisions. An overwhelming number of users rely on or look up to other consumers, which include influencers, family, friends, and other folks they know.

• This is where and how influencer marketing can boost branded campaigns. Social media influencers have perennially had a bigger and direct impact on buying decisions.
• However, as more and more consumers are banking on authenticity, it’s crucial to ensure that influencer material is authentic.
• The soaring popularity of shoddy content from a plethora of influencers proves that there’s a strong link between authenticity and imperfection.
• There are many marketing campaigns that have integrated imperfect content. Both authentic and imperfect content accompany each other.
• Nano-influencers have a low follower count. Their reach is limited and you consider it cost-effective.
• Despite all this, their material tends to thrive on the imperfect. The younger generations want an authentic model.

Creating quality content

Use templates that you can readily use. There are numerous tools out there that help you craft awesome IG posts sans any Photoshop gamble. Online design implements such as Adobe’s Spark Post, Venngage and Canva are incredibly beneficial when it comes to creating appealing social media visuals.

• Although stock images have got some bad reputation in recent times, it’s not that you will have to stop using them.
• The key is to find premium stock images and make your content great.
• If you have budget-constraints, you can use Stocksy. Since it’s a paid service, the image quality is higher. It also has a wide variety.
• Mix up your content with different methods or formats. It’s crucial to not to ignore the various content formats on Instagram.

Authenticity to aesthetics

If IG users set a reliable trend, they also represent a surge of awe-inspiring, perfect photos that actually obtained influence for influencers. Fashion influencers like Courtney Troop and Reese Bluestein don’t compromise with their authenticity and brand quality even when teaming up with high-end companies.

Despite the hullabaloo surrounding authenticity, the most popular IG accounts tell a different story. Accounts that reflect a fairy tale fantasy and are replete with stunning photos of perfectly groomed models or styled sets, or professionally decked lifestyle pictures have a mammoth following.

(Pete Campbell is a social media manager and has immense knowledge about email marketing and Instagram promotion. He delights his clients at Stormlikes by helping them buy real Instagram likes. He loves to travel, write and play baseball).