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6 Reasons You NEED to be Using Instagram Stories for Business

When Instagram stories were first introduced in 2016, a lot of people thought that it was nothing but a copycat of Snapchat. But with constant innovations and the addition of new features, people started to embrace it. Instagram is always adding new things to them to help make them, even more, user-friendly.

Years later, it seems to have taken momentum against Snapchat and has changed the way people share and consume content on social media.

In this blog, we will be discussing 6 reasons WHY you should be using Instagram Stories to market your business.

Instagram is owned by Facebook, which means their algorithm is going to be similar, the more you use their bells and whistle they offer the higher they rank you. Along with the more people engage in your posts they will see your posts more if you have common interests etc. Before the stories and posts would show up in chronological order, NOT anymore. Most social media platforms are following a similar algorithm to Facebook. They like to think they know who you are, based on interests, likes and engagement so they want to show you the stories and posts they think you will most like. Sometimes, it is crazy how spot-on they can be!

So let’s dive in . . .

#1 – Top of Mind – That is KEY!

We feel like one of the biggest reasons to use Instagram Stories is to be top of mind. It is the first thing people see when they open up their app. Once they see you once up there they are going to be looking for you even more. With Instagram Stories you can give value and keep your tribe coming back for more! The stories only stay up for 24 hours so it is a great way to increase engagement and get your message across. You want to keep your stories relevant and catchy!

Why is it important to stay top of mind? In today’s digital world people are being bombarded with thousands of different things daily, think of all the things you see on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, not to mention emails, texts, and good old fashion phone calls! If you are not consistent with your online marketing and sticking to a strict schedule you will get lost in the shuffle.

Each time you are posting a story you are giving your brand exposure, you are climbing the favorite list for your target market, and that’s what it is all about . . . being someones favorite, right?!?! Well, it kind of is with social media. People will start to notice that you are posting a story more regularly and that each story you are posting they are liking, they are engaging. They are excited to see what you have in store for them next!

#2 – Create a Strategy and Theme

People love when you are using all the components of Instagram. It’s important to keep your content fresh, get creative with it. Have a story that is a series of quick videos, images, a special offer, funny images. Get creative! One exciting way to use Instagram stories is to start creating a theme with them. Write down 10-15 different ideas for stories, be strategic about them. Maybe they are 10 tips and each story has 2-3 different components to it, like a static image with title, then short video and then call-to-action. you do this for 10 different stories each have your brand color, logo, and a video of you to build your brand.

Stories are real-time, so this is a great tool for your strategy. Stories tend to build engagement and help reach your target audience.

Think of using stories when you are at:
* Live Events
* Networking Groups
* Speaking Engagements
* Behind the Scenes
* Live Sale

Here is an example of what an AMAZING story would be, Forbes had an AARP event and they put together such a good story. They had branded images for each section of the event, such as Learn, Connect, and Health. They tied in still photos, branded photos, and videos of the event. They also branded the hashtags #DisruptAging. You can see in the first photo there are 15 little white lines, that means there are 15 slides to that story. You can have A LOT of images and videos to one story!

#3 – Let Your Creative Side Show

Instagram Stories are easy, quick and fun! It only takes a couple steps to get up your masterpiece. You can also share those stories on your Facebook page! I want to share a video with you that will show you how to create branded Instagram Templates. I know that everyone loves a pretty Instagram account when their images are all color coded, they have the same look and feel to them. It attracts people more to your feed. Well, why wouldn’t you do the same thing with Instagram Stories? We use Canva to create our brand templates:

Even though Instagram stories are made to be quick and easy you still want them to look good. By working ahead and creating your templates with Canva you are getting ahead of the game like we have said in previous posts, it is so important to be always working ahead. Create a “Story” list, what topics do you want to cover? Create the images ahead of time and save them on your phone, then you have them and can pop them right into Instagram.

#4 – Set Your Standards High

When people come to your Instagram account you want them to think . . . “Wow, they do an amazing job!” Your photos are all branded and you are giving amazing value, your engagement is high, and your stories are great! The only problem with doing stories is they ONLY stay up for 24 hours. Your photos and videos you post to your feed stay forever. That is where step #2 came in with the strategy and theme, once you have these stories and they are offering the value you can highlight them in your profile.

If your story is promoting a special offer like a one-time deal, or talking about an upcoming event that doesn’t repeat on a weekly or monthly basis, those stories are a good story to just leave in “story-land” and let them disappear in 24 hours. They stories like the 10 tips, stories about your products or services, the stories that give that value, those are the ones we want to highlight.

In this video below we will show you how to highlight a story and keep your brand consistent:

#5 – Adding Value to Your Business Profile

Think of your Instagram account as a mini website, people are going to Instagram all the time to research new products, services, and places before they buy. You want to make sure your business profile stands out. When people come to your profile they see who you are as a brand. What you do, who you are, why you do what you do. When you just put static posts up to your feed they may get lost with the new algorithm, they may not be seen as much as they should, especially if you have lower engagement. By using stories it allows you to keep bumping up in that algorithm, it’s like Instagram is giving you kudos for doing a job well done. You can’t just put a story up once, you have to be consistent. Some brands are putting stories up every day with multiple images and videos. Since you can ONLY have 1 story per 24 hours, each time you add an image or video to your story within those 24-hours it will go to the same story but then you can highlight the images you want from that story to certain highlighted storyboards.

Here are a few examples of brands that have gone above and beyond with Instagram:

#6- Connect with Your Tribe

If you build it they will come… Feild of dreams. You are building your brand to give value to your tribe, you want to give them just enough to keep bringing them back. With over 800 million people engaging in stories each and every day it is so important to use stories to engage with your audience. Get creative and maybe do a live story, have people ask questions and you can answer them with a live story.

There are two ways you can think of your stories:
1) Oh they only last 24 hours so it doesn’t matter on quality, they are quick and fast stories just to get something up every day

OR . . . .

2) Think of your stories as an opportunity to connect. Your stories can be providing value to your audience then you highlight that story. You will have a mix of stories the themed ones with your templates you created and then the live stories, behind the scenes and event stories, which are still important to have, remember it is your brand you are dealing it.

You want a brand that is raw, authentic and transparent! People want to do business with people they know, like and trust! Go to a deeper level with your Instagram account, get to know your audience.

Bonus . . . Topics you can do Instagram Stories On:

Your Goals
Showcase your products and/or services
FAQ – answer those questions your audience has asked
Exclusive Offers and Deals
Ask for people to sign-up for a Newsletter
Behind the scenes
Family Life
Repurpose Blogs
Testimonials and Interviews
Recipes
Podcasts
Events
Trends

Spruce up Your Stories

Like I said, in the beginning, use the bells and whistles that Instagram offers the #hashtag stickers, location, dates, emojis, filters etc. Try out the different options they offer the Type, Live, Normal, Boomerang, Focus, Superzoom, Rewind, Hands-Free, and Stop-Motion. These are all cool ways to be creative with your brand. The markup capabilities they have to allow you to create eye-catching images that stick out!

Take advantage of tagging people in your stories as well. Once you reach 10,000 followers you can also add a link to your stories! I think by using Instagram stories it gives your brand more freedom.
Instagram is always adding new features, remember to check them out. Here is what they are offering now:

Weather
The current time
Holidays
Days of the week
Location tags
Funny hats and sunglasses
Emojis

What do all the Features Mean in Instagram Stories:

Text – Text is an option where you can tap to type, Instagram has4 different templates you can choose from as far as Modern, Neon, Typewriter, Stong. You can then tap the small circle color icon on the bottom lefthand corner to choose a different color.
Live – The live option is pretty obvious you are about to go LIVE on Instagram! You can have it in selfie mode or turn it around. Pretty plain Vanilla here.
Normal – You can upload a picture or video, also add filters to the pictures you take.
Boomerang – You can now access the “Boomerang” app through Instagram Stories, this is in a way making your own gif. If you take a picture of a high-five or walking your dog, yoga pose, etc it will have that quick segment play over and over.
Focus – This is the NEWEST Instagram story feature. This option allows you to focuses on a subject’s face while blurring the rest of the photo’s background, this helps create that professional look. Great for selfies or products, yup, you can use this feature for front and rear facing camera modes.
Superzoom – This allows you to ZOOM super close up to an object and then is shows that process of moving closer.
Rewind – This plays your story from back to front
Hands-Free – This is great if you are doing a quick video and you don’t want your phone moving because your hand is shaking. You are still holding your phone, but you don’t have to keep holding the button, you can just tap it. It is also fun to try out the filters!
Stop-Motion – Stop Motion allows you to take a series of photos, but you cannot edit them. Once you’re done snapping photos, you tap “done” to see your story-editing tools like stickers and text. From there, you can post the stop-motion GIF to your story.

Wrap-Up

As you can see there are many options and features to try out with Instagram Stories, you can get lost in the creativity alone with these stories. Have fun with it and take your brand to the next level! We would love to hear what stories have worked best for you and which stories you have highlighted! We invite you to follow us on our Instagram account, we ALWAYS follow everyone back that follows us!

We also invite you to check out our FREE Resource page, we offer a ton of checklists to make sure your social media profiles are always at 100%. There is also an Instagram Caption Checklist that can help you craft together those eye-catchy captions to attract your target audience.

Cheers to your Instagram success!

Interested in learning more? Take a look at these articles:

Instagram Insights

Step up your Instagram Game – What makes a good image (or feed)?

Pinterest for your Business

June 8, 2022/by Amber Irwin

Instagram, Social Media

8 Reasons Businesses Should Use Instagram Stories

When Instagram stories were first introduced in 2016, most users didn’t even give it much attention. They thought of it as a “copycat” of Snapchat. After all, Snapchat came up with the idea first, right? It was a bold, unthinkable move… or so we thought.

Over the years, Instagram stories have continually evolved, introducing new features that businesses can take advantage of to engage with their audience. Eventually, it has leapfrogged its competitors and actually became a better version of Snapchat.

Instagram stories are something you should consider incorporating into your social media marketing strategy. Here are 8 reasons you should give it a try.

Preserve a high-quality business profile

Normally, the content you publish on Instagram gets saved on your profile. But with stories, the content you share disappears after 24 hours. That means you can share as much as you want throughout the day without cluttering your profile with less-than-perfect images.

Now, you can treat your profile as a portfolio, showcasing only your best and evergreen content.

Stay on top of mind

Instagram puts stories at the top of your feed, marked with a purple ring. This indicates that there is a new story published. This feature enables you to stay top of the feed – and mind – of your followers. With stories, you no longer have to compete for a spot in your follower’s feeds.

Instagram seems to favor accounts that use stories often. If you want to stay connected with your followers and show up at the very top of the newsfeeds, then you need to bring in new ones. Don’t just post stories, watch other accounts’ stories too!

Have some fun with your audience

Instagram stories have tons of features that encourage audience engagement – using stickers, taking polls, asking questions, linking music, and so much more. Dressing up your content with these features can work wonders for driving more audience interaction.

With stories, you have the freedom to let loose and have some fun with your audience. You can experiment with different types of content and test out what works. Plus, you don’t have to worry about making each post so polished. In fact, more and more consumers find unpolished and goofy content increasingly endearing.

Show another side to your brand

It can be difficult to show the fun side of your brand on Instagram since you want to maintain the quality of your feed, but stories allow you to show another side to your brand.

Instagram stories let you humanize your brand. It enables you to add a personal touch to how you engage with your audience and showcase your products and services in exciting ways.

You can use stories to share your ideas with the community, ask them questions, or share some out-of-the-box content. You can also try showing some behind-the-scenes videos, feature people who are working behind your brand or share photos and videos from team events. Light-hearted, humorous posts also work well in helping you build rapport with your audience.

Grow your audience

Instagram Stories are discoverable. Meaning, even non-followers can see your stories. This provides an excellent opportunity to reach a wider audience. If your content is interesting and engaging enough, this could lead people to check out your profile and follow you.

Instagram stories are a must if you’re looking to expand your reach and grow your audience. But if you need more tips on how to Grow Your Instagram Following Organically, we have a separate blog post for that.

Real-time marketing

Instagram stories are usually real-time, which makes them feel more human and authentic, and people like that.

Instagram Live is a growing trend, and for good reasons. Live videos allow followers to see you face-to-face and take a peek as to what happens behind the scenes. Here, you’re developing real conversation, and people appreciate it when you’re genuine with them.

Going live can also be a great strategy if you’re looking for an instant engagement boost. It triggers a notification to followers who are using the app at that moment. You can live stream events, host Q&A sessions, or just to speak directly to your audience.

You won’t be bombarding your audience

Being active on Instagram is good, but you don’t want to annoy your followers either. This is where Instagram stories come in handy.

With stories, you can post as much as you want without being intrusive. The stories appear on top of a user’s Instagram feed and it’s highlighted when there’s a new post. Users can watch them at their convenience or choose not to view them at all.

Create buzz around a deal

These short, immersive clips are visually impactful and come with a range of features that are sure to capture the attention of your audience. The temporary 24-hour time frame is a great way to create a buzz around a deal or event.

When used appropriately, Instagram stories can help you promote discounts, deals, and events, and even urge people to take decisive action quickly.

Final thoughts

More than half a billion people consume Instagram stories on a daily basis. It’s a great opportunity to open new pathways to increase engagement and brand awareness. If you’re not using stories to your advantage, now is the time to get started. Use Instagram stories to share ideas in a creative way or tell stories about your product or services.

If you need help creating a more solid Instagram marketing strategy, we’re here to help you out. Schedule a free 30-minute consultation so we can get to know you and your business better, and see how we can be of help.

June 9, 2021/by Kathlyn Angeles-Timbol

Instagram, Social Speak

Instagram Stories Features

On today’s blog, we are going to be talking about Instagram Stories. We’ve done a few videos in the past on Instagram Stories, but Instagram is always adding new features to the Instagram Stories, different options you have when you do a new story, and I wanted to just walk through those today so you can see why it’s so important to do Instagram Stories.

So, let me jump on out of here real quick, and let me go into our Instagram account. And as you can see our screen, the circle icons up top are the Instagram Stories. These are what people see right away when they get on to Instagram, and people tend to scroll through Instagram Stories before they scroll through their Instagram feed. With that being said, you can see the importance of having Instagram Stories a part of your Instagram strategy. Instagram Stories only stay up for 24 hours, unless you highlight them to one of your boards, and I’ll show you how to do that.

Creating an Instagram story

Let’s go back to our home page and we wanna create an Instagram story. So you’re gonna go up to the top where you see your circle icon with the blue plus sign, you’re gonna click onto that, and this is gonna bring up the different options.

So I’m gonna put this in the background instead of my computer, so this what’s called normal option. Instagram has added a few different options for you, so this one is breezy.

If you want this effect again, you can save it here, you can send that post to somebody. This is also where you’re gonna get the twinkle. So you’ll see when people take selfies or pictures of things, that you’re gonna see these twinkles, this is underneath this normal option.

Live video

You can still do a live video, which would be just like this us talking. It will automatically cut it the correct way, and this is gonna tell you right now that you have six active followers that have the potential of watching your Instagram Live and being able to engage.

So, you would hit record here on this button and being able to start that process. So that is the live option.

Create

The next option is Create. This is where you saw in the beginning slide, the welcome to Social Speak Network. Now, I can go to create and I can click onto this happy face up here, and this is all the options that Instagram gives you, so you can add a location, you can mention somebody, you can add hashtags, you can add cute little images which are called stickers. What I love this feature is really the data that you’re able to collect from an Instagram story.

Poll

So if you have an event, you can do a register link here, but if you’re wanting to find out what your audience is looking for, where do they need help?

This is really good for your content strategy if you’re trying to figure out where people are needing help at. So you can do a poll and I can say, “Do you need more help with your social media?” You say social media marketing or your SEO website marketing. Okay, they’re two different things, but just so… And you put the answers here, social media and SEO website. So this is gonna be my question.

Now, I can change that text that I want, and I can say, “Do you need help with your social media marketing or your SEO website?”

If you’re a fitness coach and you’re wanting to do a new Zoom class, this can be something along the lines of, Would you rather do a morning class or an afternoon class? And then you can add another poll, so you would add another question here on the next slide.

Quiz

So this is just a really great feature. You can also do a quiz where… True or false.

If you’re a health coach and you’re wanting to see what your audience knows about their nutritional facts of their food, that’s a great option. Also, you can ask questions. Rather than doing a poll, you can just ask a question to your audience as well, and you can do a countdown.

So, there’s a lot of different options here on this area under Create that I really like, and so we’re just gonna exit out of this real quick, we don’t need that.

Boomerang

Boomerang is those fun videos where it takes a two-second video. Again, this is great for the Monday morning coffee cup, cheers to Monday morning. This could be a happy Friday, this can be different quick little snippet videos.

Layout

Then the one new thing that they have come out with is this layout. This is an awesome feature for product, so you can have a four-picture grid up to a six-picture grid. So this is great if you wanna take a picture of new products that have come in or if you’re highlighting staff members, you can just keep taking those and then being able to have that as a story.

Super Zoom

Then Super Zoom this is good if you can go in here, and this usually has options like hearts or flame. You’ll see it as you hold your thumb on that button, and it’s gonna just slowly but surely go deeper to an object. So this is just something if you wanted to have maybe like a quote of the day or just different features that Instagram Stories has to offer.

Highlight a story

Let’s go back to Create, and I wanna show you how to highlight a story. I’m gonna go on here, and you can change your colors if you want to as well, down here on the left, or the right-hand corner.

So, I’m gonna go back to this bluish-purple, and I’m gonna click onto the icon and I’m gonna do a poll. And my question is going to be, Would you rather have a company manage your social media marketing or your SEO and website marketing?

There’s a certain character count here, so we may have to think of that question. Let’s say, “Do you need more help with your social media or SEO website?” So let’s keep it short and simple. And then in this option here, you can say website and SEO.

So, now that I have this complete, now I just want to hit… You can change this to close friends if you have a list already made. Otherwise, I just like the stories going out to everyone, and what you can do is then just click on your stories.

Now, this can link to your Facebook as well. So if you click on to your Send to, it can go to your Facebook stories or just Instagram Stories. So what I always do is I just click on the bottom here and it’s shared. So now when we click onto that icon again up top, our story’s uploading, and it’s right here.

Now, if we want to highlight that we’re gonna click on to highlight, and if you already have these boards created, you can go into tips for you, whatever board you have that you want this in particular slide to go to, you could click right on to that and then it would say it’s added to those tips.

So, this is a way that you can go from having that Instagram story only show up here for 24 hours, to now showing up here at the end. So they’ve got through, they’ll say, “Oh, this is so great.” And then they’re gonna be able to then see that story right there.

Final thoughts

So this is just, again, another way to help you get in front of your audience stay top of mind, and this is what people are going to be seeing, as they get on to Instagram, they’re going to see the stories and click on those before they go on to the feed.

So really thinking of behind the scenes photos that you can put into the Instagram story, Instagram Exclusives for just your Instagram followers, promoting webinars, new blog posts. Those are things that Instagram Stories work really well for.

If you have any questions about your Instagram strategy, please let us know.

August 5, 2020/by Amber Irwin

Instagram, Social Media, Social Speak

Using Instagram Story Tools to Engage your Viewers

Instagram is by far my favorite social media outlet. I shamelessly could sit there for hours following tags, searching for new wellness accounts to follow, and seeing what people are up to. But the thing that always grabs my attention are the Instagram Stories. To me, they are by far the most engaging and intriguing part of Instagram.

Instagram Stories are a huge viewer engagement opportunity. They add a personal level that truly grabs your followers’ attention.

Involving your Audience

There are so many tools you can use on Instagram Stories to make your audience feel like they are a part of your journey or your daily life. Here are the top engaging tools that you can use to engage your viewers:

Poll
Ask me a Question
Countdowns
Swipe Up

Each of these tools either ask for an action step from your followers such as responding with a question of their own or giving you their opinion, or they encourage your followers to check back for the post/event that the countdown was for.

Poll

Poll is by far, my personal favorite when following stories. It gives me a chance to feel involved in the person’s post. Polls are great for hearing what your viewers want to see. Use polls to give options to them and see what they are interested in listening to. This will encourage them to continue following you and checking in for the content they feel they had a say in. As health professionals, there are so many topics to talk about so see what information is being asked for.

Ask a Question

This is a great tool for health and wellness companies. Most people that are interested in health have questions and if they are following you, they are interested in what you have to say. A trend right now for fitness/health professionals is a Q&A session via IG Stories using the “ask a question” feature. Set up a time to have your followers ask questions, post their questions in your stories and address their questions during the videos. This involves the person asking the question and gives your viewers answers to questions they may have as well. During these sessions, utilize hashtags and tags to increase engagement and give the viewers something to follow up on after your session is complete. You can also create the label for the question meaning you can dictate what direction you want the questions to go. This will keep the conversation and videos you make focused on your specialties.

Countdowns

The Countdown feature can be great for creating excitement for an upcoming event, product release, or follow up post. Blogs are great to use countdowns for as well. It creates a buzz about your content and with the help of another feature (see below), you can have the follow up post lead directly to your blog.

Swipe Up

This can be one of the most useful and easy features in terms of marketing. The Swipe Up feature is used to take a viewer directly to a site that you would like them to see. You can increase website traffic, send your viewers directly to a post you want to highlight, or for healthcare professionals, send viewers to a scheduling system to get started utilizing your business. Consumers want easy ways to find information and we love social media. The Swipe Up feature address both of these aspects. Please note that to utilize the “Swipe Up” feature, you must have a minimum number of 10,000 on your business account.

Using Stories to Increase Website Traffic

By utilizing these features, you engage your viewers, give them a voice, provide information, and direct them to the next step. These features create an interactive environment and spike curiosity in your business. It may start just as another Instagram account for them to follow, but, if you keep providing top information that is sought after and provide an engaging environment, those followers may become future clients.

February 19, 2019/by Amanda Anderson

Instagram, Membership Only, Social Media, Video