By creating Instagram Stories and sharing excerpts of your life/ business with your followers you can quickly build engagement. However, just like other social platforms, in order to really grow with IG Stories, you need a solid strategy and not just spontaneous postings.
Typically social media campaigns that utilize Instagram Stories see about a 20% increase in reach or engagement. You want to drive interactions with your followers through Instagram Stories, and the best way to do that is by use the Instagram algorithm to your advantage. Little changes, like frequency of posting, using in-app features, and posting at certain times of the day, will help your algorithmic ranking. Lets take a deep dive into how these
Post between 1-7 Stories each day
Research shows that you gain more reach by posting one to seven Stories per day. On the other hand Instagram suggests that posting two Stories per day is the ideal way to foster growth on the app. This is where experimenting comes into play. Take the time to see what works better for your brand. What works for one will not work for all, if it were that easy everyone would be successful.
Post Stories consistently and at optimal times
Consistency is key to social media, and the Instagram algorithm agrees. Given that stories only last for 24 hours, you want to maximize the reach of that content. Consider posting your Story content a few times in one day and sharing your photos and videos in bite-sized chunks. Another factor to consider is posting your Story content at the times when your followers are most active on the app.
The best time to post will vary for every account based on its audience and when they are most active. To give you an idea of where to start, we studied the average completion rate of stories across the day.
Take advantage of creative features and tools
Use the in-app features and save yourself time, money, and energy when designing Stories. No need to use Photoshop or another expensive third-party software with a steep learning curve.
It’s important to note that the Instagram algorithm won’t promote content from other apps. For example, in February 2021, Instagram shared they are de-prioritizing content that features a TikTok watermark. So if you cross-post a TikTok to IG Reels or Stories, it’s going to get less visibility than something created natively in the Instagram app. All the more reason to stick with in-app tools.
Go Live on Instagram
Instagram Live allows your followers can passively watch your Live, interact with you in real time through chat, or request to join you so you can host the Live together.
Create Instagram Lives when you have a special announcement to make, want to host an event (e.g., a Q&A session or office hours), or want to connect with your audience on an even more personal level. When you start a Live session, your followers get notified, so more people watch and join your session.
Use Stories ads to boost reach, engagement, and conversions
Stories created for ad placements can help a small business owner drive awareness for their brand by sending traffic to a website or an in-app shop.
Use Instagram Story ads to promote blog posts. They actually outperformed our Facebook feed ads. Instagram Stories ads cost just $0.06 per click!
Story ad placements take up a user’s full screen, which means you can eliminate competing distractions like notifications and in-feed content from other brands. Here are a few ads we’ve recently spotted on Instagram:
To save you time on content creation, make use of existing Stories saved in your Highlights. If you have an IG shop, you can use product links so users can purchase your products directly through the ad.
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