It ALL goes down in the DM. The Instagram DM, that is! If you haven’t given too much attention to your Instagram DM Sales Strategy in the past, you are missing out on leads and sales.

Why?

Because your DM is a sales channel.

It is one of the most powerful places to connect with your potential customers and clients.

It is a space to serve, to overcome objections, to get to know your followers more.. and ultimately, if the time is right for them, to turn them into clients and customers.

In this podcast episode, I am revealing a few of the nuggets included in my new Instagram program around this very topic to show you the power of DM, and why it needs to be a (huge) part of your Instagram sales strategy.

That’s why in this podcast episode, we are covering Instagram DM Sales Strategy (It All Goes Down in the DM!).

Listen On: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Here are a few Instagram DM Sales Strategy secrets we cover in the episode:

• Four ways you can use Instagram DM to build your business (without ever needing to leave the Instagram platform)
• The three step strategy for systematically generating sales from your Instagram DM
• How to use Instagram Stories, Lives and IGTV to generates leads from your Instagram DM sales strategy
• How to approach selling inside of Instagram DM
• The different options available for contacting people via Instagram DM
• How to conduct an Instagram DM sales conversation (without ever being salesly or sleazy)
• How to close sales and ensure that you’re never leaving money on the table

Mentioned in This Episode:

• Related Podcast Episode | Episode 95: Five Killer Instagram Strategies Working Right Now.

Transcript

Repeat after me: It all goes down in the Instagram DM.

In this episode, I am giving you my Instagram DM sales strategy. You aren’t going to want to miss this.

I have just had two coffees so if I speak really fast in today’s podcast episode then you’re going to have to cut me some slack guys. I do have a little bit of a tendency to talk far too fast after I’ve had my morning coffee.

I actually had some interviews for a marketing coordinator position on Friday. I really felt sorry for the first candidate because I had a coffee that I drank so fast. By the end of the interview, I was really about 10x speed.

I don’t know if anyone else has that experience when they have coffee, it really affects me.

Anyway, we are not talking about coffee in today’s podcast episode. Can you believe it? 

What we’re actually talking about is Instagram DM sales strategy.

Now I know that I spoke about Instagram in last week’s episode and I shared five strategies that are working now.

One of the strategies that I shared (and I only kind of briefly went into it) was how it all goes down in the Instagram DMs. The direct message, the private messaging feature on Instagram. I could not agree with this more, and you would think I would agree with that because I said it, right?

It really has been transformative for my business to start thinking about Instagram DMs as a sales channel we could use at the end of the day.

It’s really a space to serve your followers, to converse with them because Instagram PS is not a one-way platform in terms of posting things and then heading off into the wilderness and never going back and engaging with your followers you guys should know this by now.

It’s really a good opportunity to get your followers or get to know your followers more, and ultimately if the time is right for them and if you do it the right way to turn them into customers and clients without ever having to leave the platform. Super powerful.

What I’m going to do in this podcast episode is to review a few of the nuggets that I have. It’s very fresh in my mind because I’m currently creating my new Instagram course that I have been working on including into my Instagram program around this very topic.

I think that I pulled out one of the most powerful parts of Instagram, the one that  I’m most passionate about. Absolutely.

I want to go through why it needs to be a huge part of your strategy on Instagram. Moving forward, you probably haven’t given the attention and the importance that it really deserves. 

Hot tip guys: Whenever a new course comes out you want to be the first people to get on it because it will always be at the lowest cost.

Let’s talk about DM, how it all goes down in the DM. I just like saying that: it all goes down in the Instagram DM. I think it’s a really cool name, potentially for a DM course one day in the future. Maybe I should think about that.

Let me go through some of the ways that Instagram DM can really transform your business. There are a few different ways.

Number one is that it fills the C-word which I talk about all the time. If you listen to my podcast episode you would know it. What is it?

Connection.

If you’re on Instagram to get more likes and followers, then you need to go back to 2016, because it is not about that anymore.

It is all about building connections with the people that you have: following you and, really leading with value, never being salesy or sleazy, providing a whole heap of useful information especially if you’re a service provider, you’re a coach or you’re a consultant. Really showing that you’re the go-to, the expert in your space helping people out, and also getting them to know, like, and trust you.

How does DM fit into that?

It’s perfect in terms of getting people to the point where once they feel like, you’re maybe that person because they’ve been following you for a little while, or watching your stories or reading your Instagram posts.

They might send you a DM about whatever it is that they send you a DM about and you should be inviting that (and I’ll go through that in more detail). It then starts a conversation with those people and you don’t just leave those DMs sitting there which is the worst thing that you can possibly do.

It’s such a great opportunity to build that one on one connection with people that you can’t really do in any other part of the platform.

I have always said conversations start out and social media is a conversation starter rather than a deal closer. It’s where you get to know people, where you make that initial contact. Then, if people want to take it further they’ll go into a platform like an email.

I want you to think of that DM as just as helpful as email in terms of being the next step for people to take.

The other thing that DM is really great for is growing your email list but probably not in the way that you think.

How many times have you said, or how many times have you heard people say at the end of a post or if they don’t have 10,000 followers in their stories, they will say ‘go to the link in my bio to download my freebie or to get more information about whatever it is that they’re talking about’?

That doesn’t work very well. People don’t go to the link in the bio very often.

Think about your own Instagram behavior when you’re scrolling on Instagram.

You are on Instagram. You’re not going to read a post, see what they said link in bio, click over, go to the link in the bio, head to a third-party website and download a freebie, and then head back over to Instagram.

Will that be some people that do that?

Yes, absolutely.

Is it the best way to go about things?

No, potentially not. 

If you actually ask people to go into the DM and send the link directly there, it is such a powerful way of building your email list because you’re keeping people on the platform. You can have as many links as you like in Instagram DM.

The other thing that DM is amazing for and this is for all of the service providers out there is for booking consultations, strategy calls, or discovery calls for potential customers and clients.

If he thinks that you or if you have as part of your sales funnel, the opportunity for people to have a 20-minute conversation with you or whatever it looks like to you in order to decide whether you’re the right fit for them to work with.

Using the DM as an opportunity to send the link for that consultation but to really build people out to the point that they actually want to meet with you and chat with you. That is such a great way to use DM.

If you’re a copywriter for example and you’re constantly putting out copywriting tips in the story section of your Instagram, and people, may potentially write back and say something like ‘great tip, I love that one’. You can then have a really non-salesy conversation about copywriting tips that might be specific to them.

They might say ‘this is amazing oh my gosh you really know your stuff’. From there you can turn that conversation if it’s the right natural step.

You don’t want to force it on people but if it’s the right natural step, you can say ‘you know I would love to chat with you more about some more ways that can help your business if you’re interested in that’.

It’s the next logical step and you keep doing it all without leaving Instagram.

The other thing that Instagram DM is so powerful for is for selling things.

Yes!

You don’t need to always lead people down fancy automated or live funnel in order to sell things on the internet. You can do it directly from the DM.

I have sold everything from $200 courses through to high touch programs. I know people that sell 5K, 10K, 20K programs directly from DM. It is absolutely possible to do and it is so powerful.

And finally, it’s related to selling things. It is so powerful for overcoming objections.

People might want to be working with you or might want to work with you. They thought about it and potentially what’s on their mind, but you can’t have a platform for actually chatting with people about their objections. Then you might never actually get them over the line.

Having Instagram DM as a way for people to let you know what their objections are or their reservations about (for example, buying one of your courses or working with you) on a one on one basis can be such a great way of naturally chatting to them. Letting them know if they have any objection and it’s something that you can count up, it’s your opportunity to do that.

How do you do it in practice?

I’m going to go through a simple three-step Instagram DM Sales strategy. This fully popped out of my Instagram course, very top level, but I think it’s really valuable both in terms of how the actual strategy works.

Do you want to hear it?

Yes. Okay, let’s do it.

Step number one is to drive people to the DMs in the first place.

What I want you to do is to think about your Instagram stories, your IGTV (if you use it), your Instagram Live (if you use it) and your post (although it’s a slightly different strategy and I will go through that) to fuel the amount of conversations that you get in the DM. 

If you, for example, are doing a story on tips for podcasting equipment (and I’m just using my own business as an example). You might say at the end, you might do a few slides so you’re giving tips and valuable advice and then at the end, you might say ‘Do you want to know more? Send me a DM and I’ll send you my podcasting cheat sheet that has all of the key requirements that you need to start your podcast’.

People are like ‘hell yes I want that’!

They’ll send you a quick DM and then you send them the cheat sheet and then they’re in your funnel. That’s such a powerful way of going about it.

Other ways of driving people to the DM is from stories. You could have engagement stickers where you’re asking people if they’re frustrated with XYZ and then the people that actually tap Yes to that, they are potential leads.

You can then follow up with those people in the DM and just say I totally know what you mean. Start a conversation that might lead to a program or a service or something along those lines. Other solutions to the problem that everybody is frustrated even saying that they’re frustrated in your engagement sticker. 

The real secret in terms of fueling your DM (and I think of it as a funnel) funnel because really, you just want to start as many conversations in the DM as possible. That gives you an opportunity to get people into your sphere further than simply just scrolling or looking for your story so whatever is ultimately to be consistent and to constantly make invitations.

This isn’t something that you do in a salesy way. Not at all.

You just need to be consistent with the posts that you’re putting out if you’re a post-style girl or your stories and you should consistently be doing stories. You don’t have to do them a lot but you just need to constantly have it on your radar to do.

It’s such a great way if you can use the story structure that actually ends with a call to action. A really natural call to action to send people to DM where they’ve got a sticker that you can ask people to DM you. It’s such a great way of fueling that funnel.

Does that make sense?

I hope so.

With posts, it’s a slightly different strategy. People always say, go to the link in the bio, go to the link in the bio now. Often, people will not do that.

I can see in my analytics definitely people still do click over. They still go to the link in my bio and it is a valuable piece of real estate. It is the only place that you can link ads, you can link out of IG and you can link out on stories if you have more than 10,000 followers but it’s the only place in the post platform you can link out.

What you actually should be doing when it comes to your post is asking people to send you a DM for whatever call to action. It is what you want them to make.

That’s simply because you can link so easily in DM. It’s easier because people actually do stay on the platform. It also gives you an opportunity to start that conversation with people, which is so valuable.

That is step one, you need to drive people to the DM using all of the different features of Instagram. Using stories, using IGTV, using Instagram Live, and using your posts. 

You constantly want to have that flow of conversations into your DM.

Step number two is Strategy.

What do you do with these people once you have them in the DM?

Now here’s what not to do: Do not go in with a hard sell.

The same rules apply with Instagram DM that apply to every other part of social media. You need to provide value, you need to help people. People can smell someone that’s just trying to sell them a mile. 

We don’t ever want to be that person. I also don’t recommend the tactics that you hear out there about Instagram DM strategy that’s really heavily involved in outreach.

I am an attraction marketer, which really means that I want people to come to me. I want to provide enough value that people are starting conversations with me, rather than the other way around so this strategy really does rely on that.

The key here is to be personal. Don’t send generic messages. I also see that a lot.

You just want to be really helpful.

You’re opening up a communication channel with the people that are contacting you through DM and a lot of the time somebody might just reply to your story saying ‘yeah totally resonate’. It might be like a really top-level means of study and communication.

You don’t need to have a sales conversation with every single person that writes something like that but you do want to start building relationships with people. It’s a relationship based strategy and you need to view DM as an opportunity to constantly have those interactions with people.

Not always sales based ones but moving people further along so that you’re getting to know them better. You’re getting to know their problems better. You’re getting to know who they are as a person a little bit more so that you know when is the right time that potentially they have a problem that you might be able to solve.

What I recommend that you do is that you really just once you get people into DM and you have actually established that they have a problem potentially that you can solve. You just need to let them know that you know it’s a safe place for them to potentially ask questions so there’s a whole heap of different reasons people (as I said) will be coming into DMs.

Let’s say for example that they do have questions around a program or a course or a service that you offer. You want to make sure that you make it really comfortable with them to ask as many questions as possible and let them know that it’s a safe place.

Invite and encourage them to really leave their objections. You need to really make it a safe place for them to feel comfortable asking everything that they need to make sure that they are making the right decision for themselves.

A few practical ways that you can do this is that once somebody asks a question and you give them the reply. Oh, I say ‘you don’t have any other questions just let me know’ so that it’s not like ‘oh, I can’t ask this person’.

The other thing I recommend doing is making use of all of the different elements of the Instagram DM platform.

You can text message somebody, you can send people a voice note and this can be so powerful. You can send them a video, you can have a conversation with them. There are lots of different options there.

I hear a lot of Instagram people say, ‘send people a voice message it’s such a powerful way to go about things’. If somebody’s not really a voice message person you’ll get a feel for that pretty quickly.

It’s not always going to be right going back to the voice message.

You need to get a feel for the person, what is right for them but you do need to know that those options are available because they can be very powerful.

It’s really that next level of intimate conversation and people realizing or people seeing that you’re taking the time to really spend quality time with them in the Instagram DM. That will make all the difference when it comes to whether they feel comfortable, whether they feel that you’re the right person for them to work with, to book from, to buy from, all of that good stuff.

We’ve spoken about driving to the DM, we’ve spoken about this strategy very top level.

The third step is the Close. 

The key thing that I want to get across here is that you need to treat your DM just as seriously as you would your customer service inbox. You need to treat every conversation as an opportunity for you to put your best foot forward. You don’t want to leave DM sitting there for ages at a time.

You want to make sure that you’re going back to people promptly. You want to make sure that you’re following up with people if you haven’t heard from them for a little while. If you said that you were going to follow up and they potentially might have some more questions later down the track. 

There are lots of different ways that you can do this within the Instagram platform. You can use things like flags and quick replies. Instagram has really made it very easy to take your Instagram DM sales strategy and treat it just as you would your Help Scout inbox or your customer service inbox.

Make it a part of your daily routine, set aside time for it. Use all of the tools that Instagram has in order to make it as seamless as time effective, and as efficient as possible.

I am very time focused and there are a lot of DMS. I still am able to really go all-in on my Instagram DM strategy in terms of customer service because I find and I absolutely consider it an integral, very important part of my sales process.

I highly encourage you guys to do the same thing as well.

I hope that I have sold you on the importance of DMs because guys they are game-changing. I need you to go all in.

If you are interested in knowing my exact strategy, everything that I do in order to really generate leads, sales, all of that good stuff without needing (although I still have those) fancy email funnels and all of the things that the internet marketers tell you to do because they work but these also work.

I hope you enjoyed today’s episode, and that is it for me, for this week. I will be back next week with more tips, tricks, all of that good stuff I would actually love to know what you would like to hear about more so that I can cover it on the podcast. Send me a DM. 

Yeah, I’ll leave it there. See you guys.

Keep Listening!

Listen On: Apple Podcasts | Spotify