The new features of Instagram are controversial among business owners. Features like Instagram Stories can be used for marketing purposes by businesses.
If you’re not aware of the feature and you’re a marketer then you’re missing out on the huge marketing opportunity.
Instagram is addictive but Instagram Stories is more attractive that can lead you to grow engagement, build awareness and many more.
Though it remains active for 24-hours only, you need to be thinking sophisticatedly to get positive outcomes within the fixed time-frame.
Dive in to learn more about Instagram Stories marketing tips and tricks.
Why Instagram Stories is a powerful marketing tool
Instagram is the leading photo-sharing platform with over 500 million daily active users. It is a dominating marketing tool for businesses due to the reach.
Similarly, Instagram Stories have over 400 million daily active users. Growing to be 10 years now, Instagram is still popular among users due to the attractive look and continuous feature upgrades.
Engaging features like Stickers on Instagram Stories makes it super efficient for marketers to showcase their offerings.
Lately, the induction of Instagram Story Ads has pushed the limit further
This potential of the platform is exponentially used by the businesses and influencers for marketing purposes in a much interacting and appealing way.
Let’s dive deeper to understand how you can use different Instagram Story features for marketing purposes.
Must Read: 7 Key Benefits Of Embedding Instagram Feeds On Websites
Using Instagram Stories for Marketing
Instagram Stories was introduced in 2016 and has been growing since then. It has evolved its features for supporting businesses and creators to grow. With stickers, tags, emojis etc you can use different methods to make your Instagram story more appealing and attractive.
Instagram Stories is a great source of getting engagement, staying on the top of the screen makes it easier for access by users.
The features can be used for: starting a healthy conversation, getting real-time feedback and many more.
Well, now the question that comes to mind is: How can Instagram Stories be used for marketing?
#1 Gain More Views – Expand your reach
Stop wishing for views and start acting cause in marketing action speaks louder than words.
And the best part is that the actions that can be used in Instagram Stories for marketing are mentioned below:
1. Post Consistently
You may be aware of this but still, you neglect the factor because either you don’t see results instantly or you are confused with what story to post next. Remember, consistency is the key to success.
Let’s breakdown the complication:
Firstly, Plan a calendar of posts for at least a week ahead always.
Doing so will restrict your confusion and you’ll be aware of what story post should be published next.
Secondly, The above process will automatically build up the consistency of posting.
Pro Tip: With every story post, you publish, you’ll be redirected on top of the others’ Instagram Stories, creating a domino effect.
This process will multiple the outcome of getting viewed by your audience.
2. Hashtag in Story
You may have already seen the power of hashtags in your regular feed posts. Instagram has introduced Hashtags (#) in 2011 to help users find each other as well as posts.
This can be used in Instagram Stories posts also for opening the door of wide visibility.
There are two methods of using Hashtags (#) in Instagram Stories:
One, you can use the Instagram Hashtag Sticker.
To attach your feed with a hashtag sticker just select the sticker and enter your desired Hashtag. As soon as you publish the story it will also be updated on the hashtag feed story.
But remember you can only use one hashtag sticker on a story post.
Secondly, you can use text with the prefix (#) e.g. #InstagramStories and enter up to 10 hashtags. But it may seem weird with so many hashtags on the post itself.
So, you can use GIFs or other stickers to hide the Hashtags or use the color picker and blend the text with the image to hide the text hashtag visibility.
3. Location in Story
Adding location on the Instagram story will help you get discovered based on the location.
You may be aware that Instagram lets you search for content based on the location also.
It is a good idea to add the location to the Story. It is best for the ones who have a restaurant, hotel or some resort business etc so that you are found when someone is planning for a vacation visit etc.
#2 Boost Engagement
Use Instagram Stories to boost the engagement on your account. It has got many options of stickers like a one-click poll, question-answers to emoji slider stickers etc.
Daily customize the stories with these stickers and drive huge audience interactions.
It is a fun, amusing and entertaining method to convey your brand story.
Some of the examples of using Instagram Stories for marketing with different stickers are mentioned below:
1. Emoji Slider
This is a versatile sticker that can be used and many many thanks to the library of emojis available for it. It is a great source for understanding the sentiments of the audience.
Use the slider to know whether or not they connect with the products and services offered by your brands.
Suppose you are a cosmetic brand, you can use the slider to know about the skin types or complexion of your audiences to target them with the right products for them.
2. Q&A Stickers
Q&A sticker is one of the popular stickers for many users as they let you directly interact with the audiences. Using Q&A stickers, you can allow them to ask you questions or suggest a song.
It’s an invitation for your audience to ask you anything they wish or suggests their favorite songs for you to listen to.
For engaging deeper you can even suggest to your followers that they can ask you personal questions also.
You can easily reply to the questions via DM or publish the reply on the new story.
3. Poll Stickers
Poll stickers are an instant engagement booster since they are easy to use and quickest to publish for getting your audience polls.
Write your question and customize the answer. Once they respond to it, they can see the result in real-time.
Sometimes simple works best, a poll is a great source of THIS or THAT.
Example:
Publish two photos of your product with the poll THIS or THAT. Or ask what should be your next post on the video platform, blogs or even Instagram.
To view the result, swipe up your story and see the votes of your audience.
You can even go personal too, ask whether you should watch the following movie or not.
4. Chat stickers
Chat stickers are a fantastic way to engage with your audience and start a conversation with a max of 32 participants at a time.
Your audience will click on the sticker and send an invitation based on the topic chosen for the conversation.
You’ll have to swipe up the story to see the invitation and accept it to let them join the conversation.
It is best for users with the same interest. Suppose a new trending product is launched in the market, it is a perfect fit for the situation to start a focus group conversation.
5. Instagram Live
Go live! Well, going live is a terrific way of getting the attention of users. The best part is that you can instantly get huge interactions.
The reason behind it is because it sends an app notification to your followers that _Dash_Dash_ is live now.
The portrait format of video makes your viewers feel as if you’re interacting face to face with them.
Instagram Live is a good source of a marketing strategy for interacting with your audience.
It can be a live music session, a product launch session, an informational session or personal interaction.
6. Quiz Stickers
Want a quick and amusing approach to interact then quiz stickers is a go-to method for you.
You can customize your multiple-choice questions and set the answer for them.
Then start a quiz competition among your audiences like asking questions based on your new product etc.
To raise awareness you can even adopt a prize option for the lucky winner of the quiz competition.
To view their responses all you have to do is swipe up the story.
7. Challenge Stickers
Challenge tags were widely popular in 2020, from F.R.I.E.N.D.S to Drake everyone was a part of it.
From pushup challenges to the ice-bucket challenge, users were showing a good amount of interest in it.
Though you need to nominate someone for challenging them. Instagram stickers let anyone join the challenge and try themselves too.
This can bring a boost to the engagement. Introduce amazing challenges for your audiences.
For instance – if you’re a trainer you can use squats challenges or plank challenges etc for your audiences to engage.
#3 Get Conversions
Instagram Stories is a package of features that can be used by marketers for promoting their products and services and sell directly through Instagram Stories.
With upgrades, Instagram has built the platform for businesses and brands to an extent where they don’t even have to build an eCommerce store for selling their products online.
Using Instagram Stories for marketing some of the conversion ideas are mentioned below:
1. Links
Link is a great source of taking your audiences directly to your product page for making the purchase.
All you need to do is make an attractive story image with your product in it and decorate with GIFS or stickers. Finally, add the direct link for the landing page.
Here’s the catch for the Links feature: You cannot activate the link feature unless you have 10K followers on your Instagram account.
Pro Tip: Here’s a tip for you if you don’t have 10k followers. You can post the link in the bio and encourage the viewers to visit the bio for a clickable link. Also, you can promote your link in Instagram Stories by adding a shorter form of the link in the text format.
2. Product Stickers
Product stickers are a good way to promote the product on Instagram Stories.
Similar to Instagram shopping tag posts you can use the product stickers to tag the particular product for easing the process of purchasing. Create a time-saving step for your audience to shop.
You can use the sticker on images as well as videos. This can be a win-win for the accounts that have less than 10k followers.
3. Countdown Stickers
A countdown sticker is an astonishing way to create curiosity among your users about the upcoming product or services.
Personalize it with the name, date, time and color. Make the sticker more effective by encouraging your audience to turn on the reminder.
On a hectic busy day, you may forget to unveil your product at the right date and time.
To overcome such a situation, Instagram sends a notification to you as well as to your audiences who have turned on the reminders.
4. Discounts and Promo Codes
Discounts and Promo Codes are a great way of driving the attention of audiences.
Make appealing posts with stickers and emojis to highlight the Discounts and Promo parts.
As you may be aware that Instagram also shows previews of the Stories when a user scrolls through the Instagram Feeds. If you post a highlighting discount or promo image it may get viewed by those users also who haven’t seen your story post.
These discount and promo posts will bring your potential customers to your webpage.
5. Stories Ads
The organic method is a perfect way to drive sales but sometimes to survive you gotta take a step forward to reach your targeted audiences.
Instagram Stories Ads is a great source of pushing your products and services with your relevant audiences worldwide.
Even Instagram stated that 75% of Instagram users take action after watching the ads. Such as:
- Visiting a website
- Following Instagram account
- Purchasing products
- Sharing with family and friends etc.
For displaying ads on the Stories all you need to do is use Facebook Ads Manager and create Instagram Ads to show up on the Instagram Stories.
However, you can also promote your published Instagram Stories post into an Ad.
Conclusion
Use the above tricks and methods to get views, boost engagement and finally get conversions for your business using Instagram Stories.
As Instagram Stories is active for 24-hours only you can use it for remarketing purposes by embedding Instagram Stories on websites. The topmost benefit of embedding Instagram Stories is that it will remain active on your website after 24 hours also. This is also a method of using Instagram Stories for marketing.
