8 Effective Instagram Marketing Strategies For Basketball Teams

Instagram is rapidly growing in popularity and lots of brands are jumping on the Instagram train in the hopes of reaching new audiences and growing their fan base. Sports and fitness brands are doing exceptionally well on this highly visual platform so there is no reason why your basketball team shouldn’t take advantage of everything Instagram has to offer.

In this post, we’ll highlight 8 effective marketing strategies your basketball team can start implementing on Instagram right away to connect with your audience and grow your fans.

8 Effective Instagram Marketing Strategies

1. Use Hashtags

One of the most important, if not the most important, strategy is to use hashtags with every post. Hashtags allow your content to be found and seen by other users so you have to be strategic with them. Instagram allows up to 30 hashtags for each individual post, however, bear in mind that you don’t have to use all of them to see an increased engagement.

Most brands use between 11-20 hashtags which correlate to their niche. Using hashtags that relate to basketball should be a given, but you shouldn’t disregard more general hashtags that relate to sports or even other industries.

Consider creating your very own branded hashtag which will foster a sense of community and can be used in several different ways.

2. Use Contests and Giveaways

Create a contest or a giveaway on your Instagram account to generate awareness for your basketball team. Use your branded hashtag to promote it and encourage your users to post photos with your hashtag included in order to win a prize. You can then select 5 of the best photos and let your fans decide on the winner by liking their favorite photo or you could reach out to basketball influencers on Instagram and have them act as judges and select the winner. If you establish a relationship with them first, they can even help you promote the contest which is bound to grow your fanbase.

As far as the prize goes, it could be anything from a pair of tickets to your next game or a jersey of their favorite player from the team. You can also invite the winner to spend a day with your team or participate in your training.

3. Connect With Basketball Influencers

You may not be as big as the Chicago Bulls but that’s no reason to shy away from the influencers in the basketball court. There are plenty of basketball influencers with smaller audiences but very high engagement rates who can still help you grow. Aside from helping you promote your team on Instagram, you can and should establish a relationship with them on other social media platforms for maximum results.

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4. Feature Your Loyal Fans

Nothing fosters a sense of community better than making your fans feel special. Consider choosing one of your followers that likes and comments on your photos on a regular basis and ask them if they would be willing to share a few details about why they are supporting your team. Use their answer in a photo caption (with their permission, of course) and tag them when you post the image on Instagram.

5. Use a Mix of Photos and Videos

Instagram allows you to post 60-second videos which you can use to your advantage. You can share a special message before your game or to highlight that special winning shot and convey the atmosphere from the game itself. Using videos will break the monotony of nothing but images. Plus, videos have a pretty high engagement rate on almost every social media platform.

You can also take advantage of Instagram stories to feature moments from your training or while you’re on the road to play another team on their home turf. The best part of Instagram stories is that you can add images and videos to your story throughout the day without popping up constantly in your fans’ feed.

6. Promote Your Instagram Account on Other Platforms

It goes without saying that you should display a link to your Instagram account on your website but you can also leverage your existing social media profiles to promote it. The first and the easiest step is to connect with your Facebook account and invite your friends and followers to follow you on Instagram. You can share your Instagram photos to Facebook directly from Instagram and you can do the same for Twitter. However, you can also create a few dedicated tweets asking your Twitter followers to follow you on Instagram for a chance to see more of your visual content and to participate in your contests.

7. Promote Your Partners

It’s no secret that NBA teams are often partnering with other big name brands like Nike, Toyota or even Mountain Dew. You can do the same for your basketball team by partnering with local businesses and promoting them on your Instagram account. Don’t forget to tag them in the caption. By doing this, you will expose your team to a whole new audience while showing support for your local community as well.

8. Quality Over Quantity

While you might be tempted to post multiple times a day in the hopes of growing your account quickly, focus on posting quality images rather than quantity. You should avoid posting blurry and out-of-focus photos just for the sake of posting something on Instagram. Your audience will be thankful and you will come off as a professional team that cares about their image.

Hashtags for Basketball

Looking for hashtags to use in your basketball team marketing? Try some of these:

#basketball #nba #basketballneverstops #basketballgame #basketballislife #basketballseason #basketballplayer #sports #Instasport #ballers #bball #hoop #net #slamdunk #orange #bounce #throw #court #board #jump #throw #score #tall #dunk #basketballdrills #basketballfans #basketball4life

Final Words

Once you’ve narrowed down your Instagram marketing strategy, bear in mind that you have to stay consistent to get the best results. This includes posting photos or videos on a regular basis, engaging with your fans, and replying to their comments as well as liking their photos and leaving comments not only on your fans’ accounts but on influencers’ accounts as well.

You can also use several tools such as Later to schedule your Instagram posts and an analytics tool such as Iconosquare to track your engagement rate, follower growth, reply to comments, and more.

Instagram is a great visual platform that has a large user base and allows you to show off your greatest game moments using both photos and videos. With a large number of basketball teams already using Instagram successfully to their advantage, you could join their ranks and grow your fan base significantly.

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