How to Introduce Your Business on Instagram...Or Not...

While the number of female entrepreneurs has significantly increased in recent years, male entrepreneurs still slightly outnumber female entrepreneurs worldwide. However, in the United States and some other countries, the gap is narrowing as more women start businesses each year. According to data from the U.S. Census Bureau, women own approximately 42% of all businesses in the U.S., a major increase over past decades.

Globally, the rate of female entrepreneurship continues to grow, particularly in fields like e-commerce, consulting, and social enterprises, where flexibility and creativity are highly valued. The majority of our clientele are female entrepreneurs with businesses in retail, real estate, and more recently, authorpreneurship. Depending on their business, it is usually encouraged to either delete or utilize platforms such as Instagram or TikTok.

According to Social Media Dashboard, as of 2023, Instagram has a larger user base than TikTok, with approximately 1.35 billion active users worldwide compared to TikTok’s 1 billion users. However, the main difference is engagement. Instagram users are fleeing the app in droves, complaining of too many ads and “monitoring spirits” among their followers.

In other words, people are watching their stories and viewing their posts but are not engaging, which makes the social media app, well, non-social. Apps like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and others were initially designed with users in mind—whether that meant reconnecting with old friends and family or meeting new people and socializing.

Unfortunately, there’s been a massive shift as more users are finding themselves less inclined to socialize with people they’re familiar with due to boredom or fear of judgment and more inclined to socialize with strangers, hence the creation of the “for you” page. With the increase in engagement, these apps have found new ways to get ads in front of users—through in-feed ads or allowing creators to sell subscription packages to new followers. Over time, everyone has developed ad fatigue.

Ads are on streaming networks, billboards, blogs, Reddit, music—they are inescapable. We now live in a world where consumers are willing to pay more to avoid seeing ads or subscription fees altogether. As a result, users are either doomscrolling on Instagram or quickly scrolling past anything labeled “sponsored.” Business owner Verde Alfieri says, "I also tried paid sponsorships, and it was better years ago when costs were lower for a good target. But today, we pay the same to reach fewer—really fewer—accounts. So I decided not to pay for ads anymore."

Is it worth introducing your business to Instagram in 2024? No. Instagram is no longer dominating the social media space; its owners have single-handedly degraded the app in recent years in an effort to keep up with its competitor, TikTok. Are Instagram hashtags still necessary to grow?

According to Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram: "Absolutely not." Social media has shifted to SEO, ensuring your content is found based on search relevance. TikTok, on the other hand, is a great place to introduce your business if your goal is to sell via their TikTok shop; otherwise, the answer is also no. You may wonder, “Lisa, which social media platform should I use for my business?” The answer is a Facebook Group.

Similar to musicians and their fanbases, you need to curate a space specially designed for you and your customers. Earlier this year, we covered the story of Oscar De La Renta making the decision to disinvite journalists from their fashion show in favor of inviting and shifting the focus to their customers. It’s not enough to throw emails onto a newsletter and bombard them with promotions; you need to build a space where the people supporting you feel seen and appreciated.

Nowadays, people are so used to being treated like a product by larger corporations—whether it’s Starbucks or Netflix—everyone is selling their users, but not you. You need to stand out from the crowd and take your supporters away from the noise. They need to feel special, and the only way to do that is to create a group. Sometimes, we have to go back to the basics to succeed in such a competitive market. While 99 people are doing the same thing, you should be the one person doing something different.

Most people adapt very easily to new apps and their features, and over time, as we’ve seen happen repeatedly, users are sold as products to larger corporations and no longer find joy in the things they once used to. Hire a marketing agency with the skills needed to propel your business to new heights—not by following trends, but by creating new ones that will lead to massive success. Branndet Marketing Group has you covered.

by Lisa K. Stephenson, Branndet Marketing Group