Instagram has over 500 million users every day. If you’re not using Instagram stories to elevate your business, you could be missing out on a huge opportunity. Since Instagram launched the story feature, feed posts have significantly declined. Over the last few years, Instagram stories have drastically evolved. Here are some ways you can use interactive Instagram stories to grow your brand’s profile and drive customer engagement.
New Posts
The current Instagram algorithm plays a role in how quickly people engage with posts on your feed. As a result, many brands have started promoting their recent posts on stories with a sticker blocking out the thumbnail to entice people to click on the post. Leveraging Instagram stories to promote a new post quickly can help boost brand engagement.
Announcements
Instagram stories engage in sharing new products and services or other company updates such as new team members. Announcements offer opportunities to share behind-the-scenes footage that might not make it on your actual feed. Additionally, this content allows your audience to learn more about your company and keep them up to date on the latest news.
Timely News
Instagram stories allow you to promote timely news such as new products, giveaways, or new blog posts. Instead of taking excess time to craft a new post for your feed, you can generate excitement through 15-second stories by using visual content that’s eye-catching and engaging.
Sharing Links
If your business has 10k followers on Instagram, you can add links to stories to drive conversions. You can verbally promote or write a short caption to encourage your audience to swipe up on the link. Additionally, you can add custom eye-catching “swipe up” stickers to boost activity.
Questions
The question sticker allows you to build a community and encourage customer engagement by gathering unique answers to brand-related questions. Gathering your audience’s input and feedback positions your brand as human, kind, and reliable, which leads to customer loyalty. Customers can continue responding to your questions via direct messages to advance user engagement.
Polls
Polls are a quick and fun way to engage with your audience and drive interactions. Using a poll sticker to ask a simple “yes” or “no” question related to your business allows you to see responses in real-time. This can range from market research, customer feedback, or just getting to know your audience better.
Story Highlights
Story highlights allow you to save stories to the top of your feed after they expire. Saving your stories to highlights lets new followers learn more about your brand when they land on your page. This can be a valuable way to highlight your brand values and drive business.
Going Live
Hosting an Instagram live is an excellent way to provide an open forum to your audience. It’s important to schedule it ahead of time and promote it across various social media platforms. Some valuable ways you can use Instagram Live are to unveil new products, document events, film interviews, or host Q&A sessions. Instagram will notify your followers when you go live, so it’s important to schedule them during heavy traffic times to drive engagement. The more engagement your Live gets, the more likely it will be featured at the top of the Explore page.
The Takeaway
When using Instagram stories to grow your brand, it is essential to be consistent. This helps you better reach your audience and boost customer engagement. As you share more stories, you’ll bump to the top of your followers’ feeds, positively impacting your content exposure.
Additionally, it is critical to stay on-brand with every post. There are various design tools you can use to create visually consistent templates for posting stories. If you’re not already using them, Instagram stories are an excellent way to leverage engagement-boosting features to encourage customer loyalty and grow your business.