How To Create a Professional Instagram Account: Our Pro Tips

Running an Instagram account for your brand may sound fun, but it’s not a walk in the park. Brand owners and creators constantly deal with an influx of messages, reach issues and the pressure of driving conversions. Luckily, Instagram provides plenty of useful features designed to make life easier for businesses and creators running professional pages. So today, we’re teaching you how to create a professional Instagram account and make the most of its benefits.

Churning out cute, exciting content and going viral online isn’t enough to grow your brand in a sustainable way. You also need to boost reach and engagement rates, drive sales, and understand your target audience deeply. With a professional profile on Instagram, you can do all these and more. It can help optimize your social media presence and knock your brand’s marketing goals out of the park.

Keep scrolling to learn more about how to switch to a professional page from a personal one. We’re also sharing expert tips on maximizing the exclusive features and perks you enjoy with a business profile. Let’s jump right in!

The 411 on Instagram Business Account vs. Personal Page vs. Creator Account

You can either have a personal or professional account. But what’s the difference between the two?

A personal account is meant for individuals who want to use the platform to connect with friends and family. People with these Instagram pages will post personal content, such as photos with loved ones or from their trips. It’s the type of page you’ll have if you’re on Instagram for the sole purpose of socializing with others.

With a personal account, you can only reach audiences organically. You can’t run paid ads or sponsor other creators’ posts. And while that sounds like it could limit your potential on the platform, personal pages have unique benefits, too. For example, with a personal account, you can set your page to private mode, enhancing your online safety.

Meanwhile, a professional account is designed to promote a specific brand. And there are two kinds of professional accounts.

If you have a company that sells specific products or services, you might go for a business account. It’s possible to promote a brand with a personal account. However, there are plenty more marketing tools for Instagram business accounts vs personal pages.

If you’re a striving influencer or public figure, you should opt for a creator Instagram account. This type of account is for those who want to build a personal brand.

Here are just some of the many benefits of having a professional account, whether it’s a business or creator account:

• Running paid content to promote products and services.
• Analytics reports on key Instagram metrics and audience demographics.
• Branded content partnership tools for collaborations.
• Creator Studio, where brands can manage, schedule, and monetize content.
• Unique contact and location information on your profile.
• Adding links to “swipe up” on your Instagram Stories (over 10,000 followers).

How To Create a Professional Instagram Account, Step by Step

Everyone who makes an Instagram account starts with a personal page. You should switch to a professional account if you’re a business owner or creator. Luckily, this process is super easy and free. Here’s how to do it, step by step:

1. Open the Instagram app and head to your profile.

2. Click on the hamburger menu (three horizontal lines) on the upper-right portion of the screen.

3. Click Settings and Privacy.

4. Scroll until you see the “For professionals” section and click Account Type And Tools.

5. Click Switch To Professional Account.

6. Read the reminders and instructions on the following pages and tap Continue to proceed with the conversion process.

7. Select the category that best describes your brand. There are plenty to choose from, including “Entrepreneur,” “Grocery Store,” “Restaurant,” “Product/service,” “Artist,” “Digital Creator,” and many more.

8. Choose whether you want a business account or a creator account. And that’s it, you’re done!

Now that you have a professional account, spruce up your page to make it more attractive to potential followers. Add contact buttons, a useful link in your bio, and even Story Highlights to showcase your best content.

Remember that every user can make up to five Instagram accounts. That means you can keep a personal page and have several professional accounts if you run different brands.

Do you want to go back to a personal account? Don’t worry; converting back to a personal page is super easy. Here’s how you can do it:

1. Head to your Settings and Privacy again through your profile.

2. Scroll until you see the “For professionals” section and click Creator Tools And Controls.

3. Click Switch Account Type, and then Switch To Personal Account.

4. Confirm your decision to switch back to a personal page. 

How To Use Instagram for Business To Improve Your Brand’s Online Presence?

As mentioned earlier, switching to a professional account gives you access to marketing tools exclusively for businesses and creators. These awesome tools help you promote your brand and engage with your target audience more efficiently. They’re amazing for improving your online presence and how you run your account on a daily basis.

Do you want to know about the best features you can get from a professional page? Here’s how to use Instagram for business to boost your online presence.

1. Review Instagram Insights To Improve Your Content

Professionals have access to Instagram Insights, an analytics tool that shows valuable learnings and metrics about your content’s performance. It shows you performance indicators such as your total reach, engagement rate, impressions, and more on each of your posts. You can also see a general overview of these metrics for your entire page over a specific period.

These insights are great at giving you a better grasp of how well your creative content is performing on Instagram. If you’re not happy with your metrics, use the insights to tweak your content strategy and start doing things differently.

Aside from evaluating your content performance, Instagram Insights also allows you to learn more about your followers. The Insights dashboard has an Audience tab. When you click on it, you’ll see plenty of insightful audience demographics about your followers. These include their age range, gender split, and even the times of the day they’re most active on the platform.

This information about your current fanbase helps you get a deeper understanding of your audience. It allows you to optimize the type of content you put out and when you post them to maximize engagement.

2. Add Contact Info and CTA Buttons To Spruce Up Your Business Profile

Provide your potential clients and customers with more information about your brand by adding contact information to your page. You can include your business location and phone number, which will show up at the top of your profile. This makes it easier for people to reach you and inquire about your products or services.

Business profiles are also allowed to include call-to-action (CTA) buttons on their page that users can interact with. Some of these buttons include CTAs like “Reserve,” “Book now,” or “Shop now,” and lead directly to your website.

These buttons are also displayed at the top of your profile, making it easier for potential customers to see. Note that you can only display one contact button at a time on your brand’s Instagram page.

The contact info and CTA button features are amazing for driving conversions for your business. They are perfect for any brand that wants to increase its leads, reservations, bookings, and sales.

3. Run Paid Ads To Reach a Specific Target Audience

Running Instagram ads is another feature exclusive to business and creator accounts. By investing in these paid ads, you can push out your content to your target audience. It’s a convenient way to reach people who don’t follow you but are within your ideal audience.

Each campaign allows you to choose specific audience demographics to which the ad is promoted. That way, you can be sure that you’re not wasting your money on ads that don’t even reach the right people. Targeted ads also increase the likelihood of people finding your campaigns interesting and relevant, making them more likely to convert.

There are plenty of ad formats available on the platform. You can do regular photo and video ads on the feed or experiment with ads on Instagram Stories or Reels. You can even advertise entire product collections to drive more purchases. We highly recommend creating a mix of different ad formats per campaign to maximize your reach and engagement potential!

4. Use Instagram Shopping To Drive Sales Directly From the App

Did you know that you can sell your business’s products straight from the Instagram app? Yup, this is possible with Instagram Shopping. By setting up a shop on Instagram, you can showcase your products and make purchases and checkout easy for customers.

When you have a “storefront” shop on Instagram, a “Shop” tab will appear on your business profile. Here, you can organize your products into several collections and themes. You can even give your potential customers a deep dive into every item in each collection with product detail pages. In these pages, you can provide all the descriptions and details buyers might want to know about your products.

One of the best features of Instagram Shopping is that businesses can link their product catalog to their shop. This allows you to tag specific products in your creative content, whether it’s on a feed post, Story, or Reel. These are called shoppable posts. Users can click on the product tags on your post and then shop straight from the app. Cool, right?

You can even give people permission to tag your products on their content. Anyone who comes across these shoppable posts can check out and purchase the products straight from that person’s content. It’s an awesome way to maximize user-generated content and make it more hardworking for your business!

Unfortunately, Instagram Shopping is a feature that isn’t available worldwide. Meta had previously announced that they were disabling Shops and product tagging in many locations. The feature is only available in select countries, like the US, Canada, the UK, Australia, Japan, South Korea and more.

What Is Business Chat on Instagram?

Aside from optimizing your profile and driving conversions on the platform, Instagram also allows professionals to use business chat. This feature allows businesses and creators to engage with their audience efficiently. But what is business chat on Instagram, anyway?

Business chat is a type of messaging platform within the Instagram app designed specifically for creators and brand owners. At first glance, a business chat looks like your typical direct message between a customer and a brand. But when you look closely, you’ll realize it has a bunch of unique features.

When a customer sends a brand a DM, Instagram automatically processes the message and suggests possible responses to it. The person running the brand’s account can simply choose which automatic response they want to reply to the DM. You can even set up automated replies for specific messages, like frequently asked questions. This allows busy creators and brand owners to be more efficient in engaging with customers and fans messaging them.

Business chat is perfect for big professional accounts that receive large amounts of DMs per day. Not only does it make replying faster, but it also lets you keep a consistent brand voice in each response. That way, you can get back to every DM promptly, strengthening your relationship with your audience.

How To Promote Your Business on Instagram and Boost Brand Awareness

The work doesn’t stop after switching to a professional account. After you’ve set up your business or creator account, you still need to promote your page to your target audience.

Aside from running paid ads, there are plenty of other ways to promote your newly established professional account. Here are our top tips on how to promote your business on Instagram to boost visibility, brand awareness, and engagement:

• Collaborate with relevant influencers that have a similar target audience as your brand. Borrow these creators’ influence and expertise by partnering with them and getting them to talk about your product online. Their recommendations can boost awareness and conversions of your brand just like that.
• Cross-promote your page on other platforms. If you have a Facebook page or e-commerce website, make sure to link your professional Instagram page there. That way, people who visit your shopping sites, blog posts, and content on other platforms discover your Instagram profile quickly. 
• Host a fun giveaway. Put a cool prize up for grabs and encourage users to join a contest by engaging with your page. Some popular mechanics for giveaways might include having to follow your brand’s page or liking specific posts. 
• Mount a branded Instagram challenge. Make sure the challenge is fun and easy to do while keeping your brand at the center. It’s a terrific way to build an engaged community while potentially going viral!
• Host Instagram Live sessions. Stories and Reels might be a tad bit more popular. But hosting a Live helps you connect with your target audience in real-time and build a stronger relationship with them. It’s an awesome way to candidly talk about your business, upcoming projects, or your life as a creator.

Grow Your Online Presence With a Professional Account Today!

Switching to a professional account does wonders for busy brand owners and influencers. With a professional page, you can do plenty of things to promote your brand and make social media management easier. These include running ads, driving sales with shoppable posts, adding contact buttons to your page, and many more!

Whether you’re a business owner or a creator, learning how to create a professional Instagram account is important. It takes your page from small and personal to thriving and impactful.

But the work doesn’t stop there. You need to boost your visibility on the platform to ensure your content reaches the right people.

Are you sick of running the same old ads? Let Path Social show you a new way to reach your target audience. Our AI-powered algorithm identifies your niche audience and pushes your content out to them. More people discover your content, which means you gain tons of new followers just like that. Grow your Instagram community today!