A professional account on Instagram is dedicated to people who run a profile for commercial purposes. As Instagram users have a choice between two types of professional accounts – business and creator – they are often in doubt about which account to choose.
In theory, a business account and a creator account are dedicated to completely different users; in practice, there is little difference between them. In today’s post, you will find out what are the similarities and differences between a business vs a creator account.
Professional (business or creator) account – what does it offer and is it worth it?
To start with, a few words about why it’s important to switch from a personal to a professional account on Instagram. If you would like to earn money on Instagram in the future or are already profiting from your account (e.g. collaborating with brands or selling products or services) a professional account is the only right choice. Unlike a personal account, a professional account gives you access to a number of essential features that support audience reach and sales. These include:
- advanced statistics,
- the ability to boost posts and create ads,
- the ability to set up an Instagram shop,
- the ability to add links in stories (for accounts with more than 10,000 followers).
Advanced statistics make it possible to gain a thorough understanding of audience behaviour and analyse the effectiveness of our actions. Among other things, they provide information on what content is the most interesting for our audiences, what has the greatest sales potential (number of clicks on the website address) and who our followers are.
Ads allow you to reach a much larger audience and customer base. The ability to create paid campaigns is essential, especially if sales are the goal.
Establishing a shop on Instagram, on the other hand, greatly simplifies and speeds up the purchasing process. The potential customer no longer has to go to the website and search for the products they saw on Instagram themselves, but will instead be redirected to the product page with a single click.
Being able to add a link to the Instagram story also encourages more users to go to the blog or shop page. It also increases the sales potential of the profile.
Business vs creator account on Instagram – similarities and differences
In theory and according to the Instagram website, business accounts are best for retailers, local businesses, brands, organisations and service providers. Creator accounts are dedicated to public figures, content producers, artists, and influencers.
As you know, an influencer can run a local business or an online sale at the same time (there is now a trend of running a personal brand business). This raises the question of which account to choose if we are the face of our brand.
In practice, it doesn’t matter. The business and the creator accounts are very similar and only the details are different. They are of little relevance either for observing audience behaviour or for sales.
Business vs creator account on Instagram – similarities
In both the business and creator accounts, we gain access to advanced statistics, can set up a shop or create ads and sponsored posts. We can also add links in stories on both accounts. Everything looks and works practically the same.
Business vs creator account on Instagram – differences
The only minor difference is that on the business account, we can add a company address under the “Edit profile” >> “Contact options” tabs. It will be visible in the bio and, when the user clicks on it, he or she will be redirected to the maps (so the customer can easily find a way).
The fact that I did not immediately notice any significant differences shows that the business and creator accounts are very similar.
Furthermore, the business accounts also have more types of call to action (CTA) buttons, such as ‘Book’ or ‘Order food’. Creator and business accounts also differ in profile categories – the creator account has more categories and they are different. Categories are the information about the industry below the profile picture.
Business vs. creator Instagram account – summary
In my opinion, it doesn’t matter which type of professional account we choose. Of course, this may change over time (if, for example, Instagram introduces new features, separate for business and creator accounts). For the moment, however, the two types of accounts are almost identical.
