Instagram Account Types: Personal, Business, and Creator
When it comes to creating an Instagram account, many ask, “What type of Instagram account should I make?” Instagram offers three types of accounts, each providing different features and options.
Except for Personal Accounts, Business and Creator Accounts provide valuable analytics and detailed metrics, but is there a better option? Let’s review the differences:
As of now, Instagram’s API access restricts personal accounts from using third-party sites such as Metricool and Facebook Creator Studio, to schedule and analyze content. Business and Creator Accounts have API access.
Instagram Personal Account
When you enter Instagram for the first time to create an account, a personal profile will be created by default. This profile is a bit limited since it doesn’t offer metrics and data about your activity. Therefore, you won’t be able to analyze its performance and you can’t add buttons to your bio.
As you can probably guess, personal profiles are geared towards personal use, and may not be the best option for businesses, creators, and marketers.
With a Personal Instagram Account, you can:
- Create content and stories
You can use Instagram without any restrictions. That is, you can create posts, stories, and live videos. However, you won’t be able to analyze the impact of your publications on your followers.
- Add a link to your bio
You can edit your bio and add a link to drive followers to your website.
- Link your account to Facebook
In case you also have a Facebook account you can link it to your Instagram personal profile. With regards to advertising, you can create ads but you can’t boost your posts.
One major difference, and benefit of having a personal profile, is music access. Personal accounts have a much larger library, whereas Business accounts can only utilize the royalty-free library.
This has frustrated many users, knowing that with a creator or business account, many songs trending in pop culture may not be available for content. This is something to keep in mind when choosing the type of Instagram account you want to create.
You can change your personal account into a content creator or business account any time. [check out the process here]. Go to Settings and select the account. The last option in the settings menu lets you switch to a business or content creator account. As soon as you make the change, your account will become public.
Instagram Creator Account
Creator accounts are mainly directed to public personalities, bloggers, artists, or athletes. These creators come from a multitude of professions including fashion designers, entrepreneurs, public figures, and teachers.
Creator accounts are used to separate companies from influencers. There is no limit to the number of followers that can access this type of account. The creator account on Instagram gives you tools that make it easier to control your online presence, calculate your growth, and manage your messages. Here are the specific tools:
- Professional Dashboard: track your performance and access to Instagram insights.
- Contact Information and Category Labels: Contact information and category label. These are optional and can be turned on or off if the creator chooses.
- Growth Insights: Understand what content helps grow your audience by viewing insights about your posts to calculate engagement and changes in followers.
- Secondary Inbox: You’ll have access to an inbox with Primary and General tabs. You can use this inbox to organize your messages and notifications.
- Ranked Requests: You’ll be able to sort your requests by received date or by top accounts.
- Saved Replies: This is a shortcut to use to answer your FAQs.
- Manage followers: Protect your account from unwanted followers by reviewing potential spam follower requests and removing suspected spam and bot accounts from your followers.
Creator accounts can view analytics, reply to messages, and have the option to include paid collaborations. That is, it’s similar to a business account but with certain features designed for influencers.
Instagram Business Account
Business accounts are created for local businesses, brands, organizations, and service providers.
The options for Business accounts are similar to those features available for Creator Accounts, including analytics, adding CTA buttons, boosting posts, etc.
Business Accounts have the most options available, especially when it comes to promoting a business. With options such as Shopping, Facebook Ads Manager, and access to Auto-Publish Instagram content using sites such as Metricool, this option is optimal for businesses and brands wanting to use social media as a marketing avenue.
Whether you have a business or creator account, you can connect it to Metricool to help you with your strategy, easily plan and publish content, manage your social media messages, and analyze the performance of your content, all in the same place.
Those are the different Instagram profile types, and how to use each to maximize your efforts.
Do you want to know more about Instagram and how to do marketing on this platform?
