20 Top Instagram Features you Must Try for your Business

Instagram is unquestionably one of the most popular social media platforms out there with a massive user base. 

According to Statista, there were more than 1.21 billion monthly active users on Instagram in 2021. And that number is forecasted to reach 1.44 billion by 2025.

Thanks to its massive user base & popularity, Instagram has become too big of a social media network for any business to ignore. 

While it’s true that SEO is still an essential part of digital marketing strategy for businesses. 

But neglecting the power of social media marketing, especially on Instagram, can result in countless missed opportunities.

After all, it’s a great platform to build a community and drive additional sales.  

As a matter of fact, when TikTok became an instant hit, Instagram immediately started rolling out new features to remain competitive among brands and creators.

While the new features of Instagram come as no surprise due to the competitive nature of the social media industry. The arrival of new Instagram features can sometimes get a little bit overwhelming for businesses. 

To help businesses like yours stay on top of their Instagram marketing game, we’ve compiled a list of the top 20 Instagram features you ought to leverage for your business in 2022.

Top Instagram Features for Business

Here are the top Instagram features that businesses need to leverage in their marketing strategy for 2022.

1. Professional Dashboard

Instagram launched the Professional Dashboard feature in November 2020.

It allows businesses and creators to track the performance of their posts, and access in-built tools & resources, all in a single place.

The Calendar tool, for instance, allows businesses to track analytics for the last 90 days for posts, reels, stories, and live videos.

The best part? — You can easily access your Professional Dashboard from the top-right corner of your profile page.

2. An Interactive Bio

Another best feature you should leverage for your business is the Interactive Bio.

As the name suggests, this feature lets you get creative and add interactive functional elements to your Instagram Bio.

These elements can be clickable links, hashtags, your account mentions, and even a website.

3. Reels

Reels is a prominent Instagram business feature that’s quite popular among businesses in 2022.

It gives businesses a higher chance of discoverability, increases engagement, and boosts brand awareness which contributes to capturing new customers.

The best way to leverage Instagram Reels is by creating high-quality, relevant content that resonates with your potential customers by using trending sounds. Doing so will definitely expand your reach and boost your impressions on Instagram.

4. Partnership Inbox

If your Instagram has a busy inbox, chances are you might miss out on some great partnership opportunities. Instagram realised this and introduced a partnership inbox feature.

This feature lets businesses quickly find and manage their communications related to partnerships with other brands, creators, influencers, etc. in a single location - the partnership inbox.

Businesses can easily access the Partnership Inbox inside their Direct Messages tab. Furthermore, the partnership messages automatically skip the request folder and are highlighted at the top.

5. Find Creators

Ever since the rise of Influencer marketing on social media, Instagram has been testing a new suite of features to help brands and businesses connect with creators in their niche.

Find Creators is one feature that Instagram launched to officially help businesses connect with creators on the platform.

Here’s how the feature works.

Creators add brands to their favourite brand list. Then, whenever a brand is looking for creators to partner with, the creators who have that particular brand on their list will start appearing at the top of the search results.

This, in turn, makes it easier for brands to find creators in their niche who are already interested in collaborating with them.

Brands, on the other hand, can filter the interested creators by the number of followers, age, location, gender, and more. This helps brands easily manage multiple Instagram campaigns.

6. Videos

Ever since its launch, Videos have always been one of the most-loved features on Instagram.

In fact, the rise of videos on Instagram is what led to the birth of more video-centric social media apps like TikTok in the first place.

According to a study, Instagram Videos tend to generate 2 times more engagement compared to other types of posts.

Not only that but HubSpot research also discovered that 54% of Instagram users who wish to see more videos from businesses are likely to buy their product after watching a video.

As a business, you can leverage Instagram Videos by showcasing your company culture, product tutorials, customer testimonials, and more to build trust among your followers and potential customers.

7. Live Rooms

Instagram recently launched the Live Rooms feature and it has already become one of the favourite features among creators.

For the uninitiated, the Live Rooms feature allows creators to host live sessions with up to three additional guests.

For businesses, this can open up several opportunities such as hosting Live Talk Shows with industry experts/influencers, host webinars, and Q&A sessions.

8. Social Fundraising

To help people combat the effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic, Instagram introduced a new Social Fundraising feature.

This feature helps Instagram users to create fundraisers for either a cause or their business. The majority of Instagram users are belief-driven and they’re always looking for businesses that take a stand on issues that are important to them.

This gives businesses a unique opportunity to support the causes that matter to their potential customers, offer their support, and win their hearts. Although, make note that all social fundraisers on Instagram compulsorily go through a review process.

9. Instagram Shops

The launch of the Instagram Shops feature is one of the revolutionary steps taken by Meta.

For businesses, this feature especially turned out to be a game changer during the COVID-19 Pandemic in 2020.

Instagram now allows shopping via its Instagram Checkout feature, which enables users to browse a shop, select products, and make a purchase in just a 2-tap process.

Users can now visit the shop of their favourite brands via their Business Instagram profile. The shop tab is located just below the Bio section.

10. Gift Cards

Businesses can now receive support from their loyal followers & customers and grow their sales by adding Gift Card Stickers to their Instagram profiles as well as stories.

Businesses can use the Gift Cards feature by simply adding a story sticker or a button on their profile.

Followers can reshare these gift cards on their own stories to help their favourite brands spread the word.

11. Branded Content

Instagram has released numerous features to support brand-creator collaborations on its platform.

We’ve already talked about the Partnership Messages feature and how it helps brands easily connect with creators who are already interested in collaborating with them.

Besides the Partnership Messages feature, Instagram also offers a Brand Collabs Manager tool.

It offers several other branded content features such as paid partnerships in Reels, Stories, etc. to further strengthen brands’ relationships with creators.

12. Collabs

Instagram recently launched a new feature called Collabs which allows users to co-author a post with another Instagram user.

Put it simply, whenever you post using the Collab feature, the post will appear on both your and your co-author’s profiles. You will also share the likes, comments, and view counts on them.

For businesses, the Collabs feature presents a unique opportunity to partner with influencers/creators in their industry, engage with the community, and boost brand awareness.

13. Live Sessions

Live Sessions is the trendiest Instagram feature of all time. It has been leveraged by creators, small businesses, and even big brands.

Businesses can use Instagram Live Sessions to build brand authenticity & transparency which in turn helps to elevate brand loyalty and drive more sales. Instagram automatically notifies all your followers every time you start a Live Session.

The best part? — Instagram Live also allows collaboration, which businesses can leverage to invite a co-host, a guest, or even a follower to have a great discussion. The live session can then also be viewed by your guest’s followers.

14. Story Highlights

Instagram Stories last only for 24 hours.

However, Instagram recently released a new feature called Story Highlights that now allows users to save their best stories as story highlights.

These story highlights are placed right below the bio section.

Businesses of all kinds can leverage Story Highlights in various ways.

For example, you can save stories of important events or other important moments as highlights so that your new followers can watch them as well.

15. Carousels

If you want to make your content reach maximum potential customers on Instagram and increase sales, you should definitely make Instagram Carousels a part of your Instagram marketing strategy.

For the uninitiated, Carousels is a multiple photo format that lets businesses showcase their products in a much better & unique way in front of their followers & potential customers.

You can simply share your brand story, make upcoming sales announcements, or even create interactive content to educate your target audience about your products in detail.

16. AR Filters

When Snapchat announced the launch of its revolutionary AR filters, Instagram immediately decided to join the bandwagon with its own huge library of AR story filters to choose from.

From funny faces to polls & quizzes, the Instagram AR filters allow users to add different kinds of AR effects to Stories.

Furthermore, Instagram also allows brands & creators to build their own customised AR story filters to help drive brand awareness, start new trends, and go viral.

17. Calendar Tool

If you have an Instagram business profile, I have some exciting news for you. Instagram has now doubled the data tracking period of Instagram Insights from 30 to 60 days.

This is good news because businesses can now finally ditch the expensive third-party apps to monitor a longer tracking period. Instead, businesses can now easily find this information available directly from the Insights of their Instagram account.

Instagram extended the data tracking period after listening to the feedback of its business users who have constantly been sending requests for such an upgrade.

18. Tagged Products

Instagram now allows businesses to tag their products in their posts as well as stories.

This is a great opportunity for businesses to showcase their products in action or through user-generated content from their customers’ mentions.

For example, let’s say that you sell wristwatches.

In this case, you could either feature a model wearing your brand’s wristwatch. Or, you can even share a post/story of one of your customers wearing your wristwatch with a shoppable tag on your product.

This can significantly increase traffic to your website and overall sales of your products.

19. Subscriptions

Instagram recently launched the Subscriptions feature as an effort to help creators make a living from the platform. And guess what? — The feature instantly became the most popular among creators.

With Instagram Subscriptions, creators can start charging a monthly subscription fee in exchange for exclusive content as well as benefits.

Here’s how the Subscriptions work. — A creator sets a monthly subscription price and a “Subscribe” button immediately starts appearing on their profile.

With this option, they can offer a variety of benefits to the subscribers of their choice. The benefits could be exclusive posts, access to live streams, subscribers-only stories, etc.

20. Uploading via Desktop Site

Until recently, Instagram did not allow its users to upload photos and videos using the desktop.

However, the social network has finally made it possible to post photos and videos using the desktop version of Instagram.

This feature, however, does not yet allow Instagram users to add Stories and Reels via desktop. Furthermore, you can only upload videos that are only 1 minute long or less.

Leverage Instagram for your Business

Instagram has become one of the most popular and second most-downloaded social media apps. From a simple photo-sharing app to a fully-fledged social network, Instagram has evolved significantly since its inception.

If your business is not taking advantage of Instagram as a part of its social media strategy, you’re missing out on incredible opportunities the platform has to offer.

All of the Instagram features mentioned in this post have a remarkable potential for businesses to build brand awareness, increase website traffic, and boost conversions just like a successful SEO strategy.

Not sure how to get started with Instagram marketing? — We strongly recommend consulting with a reputed Digital Agency and seeking professional assistance to get started.