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Writer's pictureRita Yuan

How to Optimize Your Instagram Bio

Information in this blog post was obtained from Social Media Examiner, Hubspot, and the Hubspot Blog.


A people is working on a laptop
Image courtesy of Media from Wix

As a worldwide social media platform, Instagram is a crucial existence in the world, according to Statista, the distribution of Instagram users worldwide as of January 2023, most users are between 18-24 years old, and men are the dominant group. The young generation is more active on Instagram since it is more visual, which means that it is very easy to share photos and short videos. Every user on Instagram could connect with the world easily, make friends, see people's various lifestyles, follow stars, learn about new events, share personal life, and do business marketing.


Are you still confused about how to start your Instagram profile, especially the bio? Are you still searching everywhere for how to optimize it? Here we go, don't miss it.


As a university student, I got confused when I first use Instagram. I want to record and share my overseas study life in the US but I don’t know how to start the first step on Instagram. Fortunately, As a digital marketing major student, I learned a lot of tactics for using different social media platforms, what I am most interested in is Instagram, the most basic but important step of beginning your Instagram account is your Instagram bio. For every user, the first step after logging in to Instagram is to fill up your profile. A beautiful profile makes you stand out and attracts the audience's attention. A wonderful bio makes you impactful. Take it seriously your profile and bio for Instagram, which brings you a great impression.


Why Optimizing Your Instagram Bio for Business Helps Your Marketing

To optimize your Instagram bio, Social Media Examiner gives us some helpful tips. With the right mix of features and copy, your organization's Instagram bio can give current and existing customers the information they need and guide them toward the next steps. A successful business bio for Instagram can:

  • Show customers where to shop for your products, which means you need to add a link to your business website in your business profile.

  • Tell prospects how to contact your team, which means you need to leave your contact information, such as email and phone, in the business profile.

  • Clarify addresses and physical locations, you need to add your geographic location in your business profile, so potential clients or partners can find you.

  • Prompt people to take specific actions like ordering food or viewing your shop, which means you need a strong CTA to motivate users to take action,

  • Provide social proof that builds trust and credibility, if your business wins any business competitions or awards, you can add it to your business profile, which can increase the trust and goodwill of potential consumers.


4 Tips for Optimizing Your Instagram Bio

Tip 1: Instagram Name

If you are doing a business account, this is exactly the business name that makes your audience find and remember you easily.


Tip 2: Instagram Picture

Profile picture: your profile picture should be clear with a high pixel, trying to have your business logo will make you stand out and be impactful, and after uploading your profile picture, don’t forget to double-check if any information was hidden. Meanwhile, don’t forget to keep consistency with your profile on different social media platforms.

A people is taking food picture with a phone
Image courtesy of Media from Wix

Tip 3: Instagram bio Link

This is a link connected to your business website, your potential customers could click it and explore your business website without searching it. It works like CTA, so if you are a service or product company, adding “shop now” ahead of your link is more motivating. Linktree is a great app that lets you customize text-based links to design your own Instagram login page with Linktree. For example, Loreal_brasil's bio links to its official website, which allows customers to access external resources related to each post.


Loreal instagram bio picture
Image courtesy of Media from Instagram

Loreal instagram bio picture
Image courtesy of Media from Instagram

If you create an official account for your restaurant on Instagram, you can not only regularly promote or share photos and videos of your restaurant’s dishes on Instagram, but the more important goal is to increase your sales. Therefore, it is very important to add a link to your restaurant on your bio, which allows potential users to quickly learn about the restaurant and make online reservations, which is more efficient and direct than traditional telephone or email reservations.


Instagram Bio Example for a Restaurant

Thanks to Instagram's CTA buttons, restaurants and cafés have multiple options for offering food orders and reservations. Outlets that offer eCommerce can also set up Instagram shops to make browsing and buying a breeze.


The @breadblok Instagram bio offers both options. Local customers can tap the Order Food CTA button to order baked goods for pickup or delivery. Long-distance customers can tap the View Shop button to have orders shipped across the country. The bakery's story highlights provide other helpful information including tours of the café, retail outlet features, and behind-the-scenes glimpses.


Instagram Bio Example for a Media/Entertainment Company

For media and entertainment companies, Instagram can serve as a portfolio and a lead generation opportunity. That means it's helpful to balance work samples with social proof.


The @chanel.productions Instagram bio succinctly lists the production company's specialties and service area. The story highlights give potential customers a glimpse of the company's work and its happy customers, while the linked landing page makes it easy for customers to book a photo or video session.


For more information about the Instagram bio link, Anna Sonnenberg gives a great example here.


Tip 4: Instagram Description

This could be a short introduction about your business feature or your mission, or your vision statement within 150 characters, be clear and concise is important, and try to resonate with social media users. HubSpot utilizes a mission-focused bio with the slogan #GrowBetter to articulate the company’s values. This reinforces both the company’s values and what users get out of the CRM.


At the same time, the brand voice that describes your business profile is very important. The unique way and tone combine the personality of the brand. When you use your brand voice to tell your brand story, consumers will immediately think of you. Without a unique brand voice, it is impossible to have a unique personality. Humor can make you stand out and set a tone for the customer experience. What we like is how Contiki uses neat, witty, and playful language to articulate its values to the young target audience.


Pro tip: Humor won’t work for every brand. If your tone is serious or buttoned-up, consider a different voice. If you're looking to seem personal and more fun, humor can be a great tool.


Bio for Instagram format:

  1. Letters: This is a basic format to organize your description and remember to avoid grammar and spelling mistakes. The North Face bio is only a mission statement with a link that leads to product categories. For well-known brands, a simple hashtag can be enough for a whole bio.

  2. Numbers: It could be your contact information number, address number, sales, and numbers of stores. Semrush’s bio is distinguished by the number of users. Ten million marketers are users — an impressive number to boast about. This instantly adds to brand trustworthiness. Therefore, add big numbers in the Instagram bio to impress prospective customers and remind current ones they’re a part of a large community.

  3. Punctuation: Using proper punctuation makes your sentences more professional.

  4. Emojis: Many brands run away from emojis because they believe it hurts their brand’s credibility. However, when used appropriately, they’re an eye-catching tool that can help you attract users. Also, emojis could break up the information and make it more readable. For instance, bold and provocative Instagram marketing messaging is a distinctive trait of Hootsuite, a social media management platform. This tactic is a great hook for the audience, triggering an emotional response.

Instagram Bio Example for Healthcare

Healthcare providers on Instagram can improve visibility by using location- and specialty-focused keywords. To attract new patients and serve existing ones, it's helpful to share trustworthy resources and provide clear contact options.


For example, @drmollyhayes states her specialty (“Biological/Functional Dentist”) in her display name. In her bio, the dentist clarifies her service area and shares what sets her apart from other providers (“dentist for the kinda crunchy crowd.”) The bio's call to action and linked landing page make it easy for patients to find the resources they need.


What the Best Instagram Bio Ideas Have in Common

In this blog, we’ve covered a lot of Instagram bio ideas. So how do you choose one for your brand? Well, as long as it meets these criteria, you’re set:

  • It tells a story.

  • It reflects your brand voice.

  • It complements other elements on your page.

There isn’t a single right way to write your Instagram bio. You can try a combination of these tactics and or stick to one method and find great success with both.


A Instagram profile example
Image courtesy of Unsplash

For more information about Instagram marketing tips, go read my colleague Tim's post about them here.



Resources

Sonnenbery, A. (2022). 9 Instagram Bio Ideas for Business. SocialMediaExaminer. Retrieved from https://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/9-instagram-bio-ideas-for-business/


Becker, B. (2021). How to Add a Link to Your Instagram Bio. Hubspot. Retrieved from https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/link-in-bio-instagram


Bretous, M. (2022). 10 Instagram Bio Ideas to Help You Write an Impactful Bio. Retrieved from https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/instagram-bio-ideas

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