Hundreds of third-party tools and apps enable Instagram engagement. They include the ability to track analytics, promote products, and even transact sales directly through the platform.
Here’s a list of ten that are well suited to ecommerce. All are free to use unless specified otherwise.
1. 10sec
10sec is an online marketplace service that turns your Instagram account into an online store. According to the website, the process takes just under a minute to complete.
All that’s required is taking a photo of an item with Instagram, use the hashtag “#10sec,” add the price including shipping in the caption area, and post.
Customers can purchase an item at the set price, or make an offer at a lower price. Payments are processed through the platform via credit card, and you can ship the item using a pre-paid shipping label provided by 10sec. The company transfers money into your bank account in about a week.
Although 10sec plans are to charge a 10 percent transaction fee at some point in the future, currently it is completely free to use.
2. InstaOrders
InstaOrders is another platform that facilitates ecommerce purchases through Instagram. Unlike 10sec, it does not manage payment transactions directly. Merchants still have to collect payment using PayPal or another gateway.
Here’s how it works.
- Sign in to your Instagram account at the InstaOrders website. InstaOrders asks for information such as email address, city and state, currency, and a business description, and then imports your Instagram photos. This is a one-time process. Afterwards, InstaOrders automatically syncs with Instagram.
- Price your products. Price your imported photos and convert them into shippable items.
Once you complete these two steps, your store is set up and you are ready to take orders. InstaOrders sends an email each time you receive a new order.
3. Totems Analytics (formerly Nitrogram)
Totems is an analytics platform that enables you to track the performance of your Instagram account and benchmark it against competitors. Trackable metrics include audience profile, audience growth and churn, the average engagement in terms of likes and comments, and best performing posts.
Users can access detailed reports for posts published on a specific #hashtag, and engage with followers from a unified web interface.
Starting at $149 per month, Totem’s price may exceed many small-business budgets.
4. Iconosquare (formerly Statigram)
Iconosquare provides several tools in its platform, including a viewer, which enables you to use your computer to see the different sections of Instagram just as if you were on its mobile app. Other tools include the following.
- Photos and videos posted by people you follow.
- Your own feed.
- Photos and videos you have liked.
- User profiles.
You can also like and repost photos, post comments, follow users, and share photos to other social networks such as Pinterest, Tumblr, Facebook, and Twitter. The platform includes a search engine, as well.
In addition, Iconosquare also offers detailed statistics tracking for your Instagram account that includes total number of likes received, most liked photos, the average number of likes and comments per photo, follower growth charts, and more.
You can manage your account through the platform and even promote it through photo and video contests, Facebook Page tabs, photo gallery widgets, and follow buttons, which you can embed on your website.
With the exception of contests, which is a premium feature, Iconosquare is free to use.
5. Overgram
Overgram (also referred to as “Over”) is an iOS app that adds text and artwork to photos. This has become a popular practice often seen on social networks like Facebook and Twitter.
The app has 28 fonts that cover major stylistic categories such as fun, professional, artistic, and hand-drawn. It also includes features for editing text and images.
6. Offerpop Photo Contests
This feature allows you to promote your business using photo contests, where fans can submit and vote on their favorite pictures across social networks. It is a turnkey solution optimized for use on mobile devices.
Offerpop photo contests are free to try. Pricing starts at $16 per month.
7. PicFrame
PicFrame helps you combine multiple photos into collages and share them on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Flickr, and Tumblr. It is available on iOS, Android and Blackberry. A desktop version is also available for Mac computers.
8. dlvr.it
dlvr.it provides you with a way to instantly syndicate content. Recently, the site added a feature that allows you to share Instagram photos to all your social networks.
9. PicFlow
PicFlow is an iOS app that turns Instagram photos into a slideshow, with music.
10. Instarchive
It’s always a good idea to have a backup of photos you have posted to Instagram. A tool called Instarchive does just that. It collects all your photos and stores them in a zip file to save on your computer.