Instagram – What’s the Story?
Instagram is where the cool kids have been hanging out with their flatlays, flat tummies and perfectly manicured nails and lawns. But don’t feel too overwhelmed or under pressure, instagram is generally a softer and kinder place which offers a great space for creative businesses to flourish.
If you are completely new to Instagram, I have written a Beginners Guide to Instagram here which will give you what you need to get going and give you some food for thought in terms of grid styling, post writing, scheduling and hashtags.
STORIES
Instagram Stories offers huge potential for the growth of any brand. Everytime I create stories with relevant hashtags for any one of my clients then the account will grow, engagement spikes, and sales have a nice peak (woop!). Instagram lives are displaying fantastic results too.
Bigger accounts with over 10k followers and advertisers can add links to specific pages on their stories in order to drive direct sales - can I get a hell yeah?
The only drawback I personally find with stories is the difficulty of creating on-brand graphics and posting via a smart-phone. I prefer to schedule social media using Buffer in order to avoid being sucked in and to maximise use of time, so currently that is a bit tricky.
There are some apps like Later that support posting stories which does ease this burden somewhat. However, if you are only creating stories for your own business, then I think it's a manageable scenario to do without any kind of scheduling tool.
HIGHLIGHTS
Stories disappear after 24 hours, but anything that could stand the test of time can be saved to your highlights. This is a nice feature and can be used to highlight key services and products.
Lauren (right) uses the highlights feature brilliantly to focus on key stories, especially when she is launching a course or webinar.
ADVERTISING
Advertising via Instagram Stories is a fantastic low-cost way to reach a wide audience - something I do a lot for my clients.
I'm working on a tutorial for that for my upcoming business membership community, which will step you through the process. I'll also show you how to create some great graphics and highlight best practices. Stay tuned to find out how you can access that.
Instagram's popularity is now booming across all generations. It's acquisition by Facebook has no doubt led to its phenomenal growth. There are businesses that have been built entirely on the back of this aesthetic-led platform. Maybe yours will be too?
Go get stuck in!