Instagram ads

Who Instagram ads suit best

Instagram ads pay off when the product sells itself visually and the buyer is somewhere between 18 and 50. Salons, med spas, restaurants and cafes, fitness studios, jewelry and fashion brands, florists, interior designers and course creators usually do well. A plumber or a tax preparer can advertise on Instagram too, but Facebook or Google is generally a better first stop for them.

The audience also expects a certain look. Ads that feel like ads get skipped. Ads that look like a post from a real business, shot on a phone, with a person in the frame, get watched. That shapes how I plan creative from day one.

Building Instagram ads from what you already have

You probably have more material than you think. Most owners have hundreds of photos and clips on their phone that never made it to the profile. I go through them with you and pick:

• the hook: the first second of a Reel that makes someone stop (a transformation, a sound, a surprising detail),
• the proof: a real result, a happy customer who agreed to be shown, a short review you have permission to quote,
• the offer: what to do now, in one line.

Under the FTC's Endorsement Guides, a review or creator post you paid for, or gave a free product for, should be disclosed as such. And the FTC's rule against fake reviews applies to ads too, so every quote in an ad must come from a real customer.

Reels first, but not Reels only

Reels currently give the cheapest reach on Instagram, so most of my campaigns lead with vertical video. Yet a jewelry store's best seller might sell better as a carousel in the feed, and a salon's last-minute openings fit Stories perfectly. I run placements together at first, then look at cost per booking or sale by placement and shift accordingly. The broader logic of Facebook and Instagram in one plan is on the Meta ads management page.

DMs are a sales channel

On Instagram many people would rather send a message than fill in a form. That's good news if someone answers quickly and bad news if DMs sit for two days. For businesses with lots of questions, I set up campaigns that open a chat, add saved replies and, where it makes sense, a chatbot for Messenger and Instagram that answers prices and opening hours at 11 p.m. The Messenger and WhatsApp ads page explains how chat campaigns are measured.

Common mistakes I see

• Running the same horizontal video in Reels and Stories with black bars around it.
• Sending ad traffic to the Instagram profile when the goal is a booking. Send it to the booking page.
• Measuring success in followers. Followers are nice; bookings pay rent.
• Letting comments under ads go unanswered. People read them before they buy.

Budget and timing

Instagram ads share Meta's auction with Facebook, so the same budget logic applies: from about $1,500 a month for most businesses, less for a single local studio with a small audience. Plan around the US calendar too. Beauty and gift businesses get busy before Mother's Day, prom season and the December holidays, while restaurants and fitness studios often see a January bump. I start campaigns a few weeks before a peak so the learning phase is over when demand arrives, instead of paying full price to learn in the busiest week.

Working with me

I set up and manage your Instagram ads myself, in your own ad account. You approve each ad, get a report every two weeks and can stop with one month's notice. Pricing is shared with Facebook because it's one system; see advertising pricing for the full list.