Tagging Products on Instagram

Note: This feature is not available on every Ecommerce tier plan. If the feature is not available for your plan, you will see the corresponding notification.

You can sell your products on Instagram by tagging them in posts and stories. As a part of the Facebook ecosystem, Instagram uses a Facebook Shop catalog to find and tag products. Once your products are tagged, customers can see a bag icon and tap a link to view the item’s name, pricing, description, extra photos, and a direct link to your storefront product page to purchase a product. 

With an online store, it will sync and connect Facebook Shop with an Instagram business profile in a couple of clicks. As a result, you'll have multiple sales channels — product catalog will appear on the website, Facebook Page and Instagram – and to manage catalog and orders from one place, the Store management.

Requirements for Selling on Instagram

You need to approve your store for selling on Instagram. To get the approval, your business must meet the following requirements:

  • You need to have an online store.
  • Your products need to meet the product requirements for selling on the Facebook channel (since Instagram is the part of Facebook). Your catalog needs to be eligible according to Facebook's Commerce Policy and comply with the merchant agreement.
  • Your Facebook account and page and your Instagram professional account must meet the Commerce Eligibility Requirements (this may include having a sufficient follower base).
  • You need to set up a Facebook Shop and get Facebook approval. Your Facebook page can't have any age or country restrictions. (Instagram uses your Facebook Shop catalog to find and tag products.)
  • Verify your domain to confirm that you own and represent your domain.
  • Your business must be located in a country or region that is supported by Instagram.
  • You must convert your Instagram profile to a Professional Account. You can choose either a Creator or Business account to tag your products.
  • You should update your Instagram app to the latest version.

Verifying your domain for Facebook

As a part of the Facebook ecosystem, Instagram uses your Facebook Shop catalog to find and tag products. To ensure that only verified owners can edit the way their content appears on Facebook and Instagram, Facebook needs to verify the domain in which you intend to sell from. Before setting up Instagram Shopping, you need to verify your domain, so Instagram marks your business as eligible for selling on its platform.

You can verify your website domain either by adding a record to your domain settings, or by adding a tag code to the source code of your website.

If you used another website builder to create your website, to verify your website ownership with Facebook:

  1. In Facebook Business Manager, go to Business Settings → Brand safety → Domain.
  2. Click + Create a new domain.
  3. Select one of the verification options:
    • DNS Verification — you can use this verification option if you use a custom domain with your website and can edit its DNS records.
    • Meta Tags — choose this verification option if you have access to the source code of your website. You can also use the HTML injection feature.

It may take up to 72 hours for Facebook to find the meta-tag code. If the domain status is still Not Verified, you'll need to click Verify again or confirm the meta-tag is listed in the scrape results in the Sharing Debugging Tool.

Setting up Shopping on Instagram in the Store

Shopping on Instagram provides access to Instagram’s platform through Facebook, as Instagram uses the Facebook Shop catalog to find and tag products. You can connect your Facebook Store and Instagram account at once to run your business on different sales channels.

Note: Before setting up Shopping on Instagram, make sure you verified your domain and your store meets all the requirements. 

To connect your Instagram Business page along with your Facebook page to your store: 

  1. From your store admin, go to Instagram and click + Connect.
  2. In the popup, log into your account or continue with your account if you are already logged in.
  3. Choose what checkboxes to tick:
    • (optional) tick Facebook Ads to run ads on Facebook and Instagram;
    • tick Facebook Shop so your products are shown on your Facebook Shop page. You need Facebook Shop as a digital storefront to display and sell items from your catalog on Facebook and Instagram.
    • tick Instagram Shopping to be able to tag your products on Instagram.
  4. Click Get Started.
  5. Follow the wizard to complete the Instagram Shopping setup. 

Once complete, Instagram will automatically begin the review process for access to product tagging.

Note that the system can’t enable the product tagging feature for your store. You should now wait for Instagram to approve your account for the Shopping feature. According to Instagram, processing time varies from a few days to a few weeks.

As soon as your account is approved, you’ll receive a notification in your Instagram app that you can turn on the product tagging feature in your Instagram account.

Enabling product tagging on Instagram app

Once your account is approved for product tagging, you may enable the feature in Instagram:

  1. From your Instagram app, go to your business profile options, then go to Settings.
  2. Tap Shopping, and then confirm your Facebook account.
  3. Select a product catalog to connect to your business profile.
  4. Tap Done.

If you don’t see the Shopping section, your account is probably still under review. If your account hasn't been approved for the product tagging feature, please make sure you have fulfilled all the requirements for getting access to the product tagging and wait a bit more. 

Tagging products on Instagram

After you've been approved and completed setup in Shopping in Settings, you can start tagging products in both new and existing posts and stories. You can tag up to 5 products per single-image post or 20 products per carousel.

If your products have variations like sizes or colours, Instagram counts each product variation (e.g., size or colour options) as a separate item. Don’t be alarmed if the total number of products in your Instagram catalog exceeds the number of products in your Facebook Shop.

To tag a product:

  1. From your Instagram app, select a photo for the post, add filters, and a caption.
  2. Tap the products in the photo that you want to tag.
  3. Enter the names of the products you want to tag.
  4. Select them as they appear in the search box.
  5. Tap Done and Share your post.

Instagram will review your product tags to ensure they comply with Instagram’s commerce policies. The review process usually takes a few seconds, but sometimes Instagram takes more time to check the product in detail.

Tags under review are marked as Pending. These tags will be visible as soon as they are approved by Instagram.If you delete a product from your catalog or the product runs out of stock, the associated tag will be removed from all posts where it was featured. Note, this product tag won't reappear when the product comes back in stock.

Tapping the product tag from your post provides the following information for your customers:

      • The product’s image from your site
      • The product’s description
      • The product’s price
      • A link to purchase the product on your website

After publishing nine shopping posts, businesses receive a persistent Shop tab on their Instagram business profile. This allows customers to view all posts with tags from your account easily.

See the How do I move or delete products I've tagged on Instagram? article in the Instagram Help Center to learn how to move or delete product tags on Instagram.

Best practices: Preparing your business account for a review

Follow the tips below for your store’s Instagram account to be faster approved for tagging products.

  1. Get a business profile for your store’s account. If you already have a personal Instagram account with brand-appropriate content and an established following, you might want to simply convert it to an Instagram business account.

You could also choose to create a brand-new Instagram business account. This is the right choice if you don’t have an existing personal account, or if your personal account does not accurately represent your business.

Note: If you are a business or public figure and sell products, we suggest creating a separate Instagram account for your business. This makes it easy for Instagram to recognise your business. As only Business profiles are allowed for product tagging. You can utilise Creator profiles, which have extended features like statistics about your followers, contact buttons, etc.

2. Tweak your bio. Here are some quick tips:

        • Explain in 140-160 characters what your brand is all about.
        • Utilise business terms like “Store company”, “Official shop”, etc.
        • Be sure to include a clickable link to your website.
        • Include a branded hashtag to curate images and videos.

3. Make sure you add variable details such as a business address, contact phone, and email using a button area displayed underneath the initial information.

4. Assign the right category. Check the category assigned to the Facebook page your Instagram account is connected to. If it’s blank, update it to the appropriate business category. Again, this makes it easy for Instagram to recognise you as a business.

5. Use your store logo or mascot in a profile image. This helps people (and the Instagram team) who visit your page to recognise your brand the quickest.

6. Post brand-specific content. Here are some tips on what business should post on Instagram:

        • Create high-quality product photos
        • Use video to showcase your product
        • Reveal behind-the-scenes of creating products
        • Educate your audience on using your products
        • Entertain and engage your audience: run contests or do a fun quiz
        • Showcase your products as part of a lifestyle
        • Curate user-generated content

7. Post consistently. This can help you maximise engagement without hitting any lulls or stretches without updates. Any Instagram strategy should clearly outline a target post frequency to help keep you on track.

8. Add more products to your catalog. If you have a limited catalog (under ten products or so), consider extending. You can enhance your offerings with services or product accessories.

9. Consider setting up Facebook Business Manager for your business.

10. Make sure your business meets Instagram’s requirements to be approved for product tagging.

It might take a while to get access to product tagging. We get it. We hope this information helps get your store closer to leverage the Instagram sales channel.