PART 1: The beginners guide: Instagram stories

As people increasingly use social media for personal purposes like shopping and customer services, Instagram Stories are a great outlet for a company to promote product or services, test Influencer marketing and promote ads. This allows for an Instagram marketing service to hone in on branding and creativity!  

This is also another outlet to reach a larger audience and continue to garner a larger following and community through social media strategies! 

Why bother with them? 

Why would a company even bother with Instagram Stories? Yes, a 24 hour story could help to increase engagement, impressions and following. Instagram Stories allow for a curious potential consumer to learn more about products and gain valuable insights about your brand and company! 

Over one billion consumers use Instagram on a monthly basis and half of these Instagrammers watch stories every day! Yes, many Instagrammers are checking out those 24 hour stories on a company’s page! Instagram stories are fun to create, allow for different types of content curation, are more relaxed and are easy to digest. 

While a company might be ready to dive into Instagram marketing efforts, our marketing agency Omaha provides Instagram marketing services warns a company that Instagram stories are not a walk in the park. While stories are only up for 24 hours and can be more relaxed, it is still important to create a content calendar or implement a different marketing strategy with your stories. This is because while it is fun and new, just posting to post on stories is the same thing as having no strategy behind posting on Instagram itself. 

What kind of content can a company create to help stay on brand while achieving any goals? 

How to use them

Tutorials 

Are you noticing that there are common questions and concerns that are being asked? Is a client asking you to show them for the 10th time how to do that one thing? This is a great place to create an educational tutorial. A tutorial can be a simple how-to video to a product demonstration, but all that really matters is that it is relevant to your audience and is educational. 

The sequence of Instagram stories makes it especially easy to post the videos or photos in an orderly sequence! 

User Generated Content 

User Generated Content is nothing new in the digital marketing industry; however, consumers are searching for more relatable content that they know is trustworthy. This is where User Generated Content comes into the digital marketing strategy. Customers and consumers who write reviews, tag you in posts, blogs or anything else that are not being sponsored to write this content is UGC. 

How can a company use this in their marketing strategies? Our marketing agency Omaha suggests to share their story or post right to your story! Add a small caption thanking them, congratulating them or add a link to that service! It is really that simple. Are there a ton of reviews that are just sitting there? Put them in the weekly rotation of Instagram stories. 

Behind The Scenes 

Consumers want to know that companies have real people! A company who is alive and doing fun, exciting things is one that a consumer wants to stay up-to-date with.

The BTS can be as simple as, “A day in __ life.” Which follows an employee around for the day and shows daily tasks. Another can be a company outing, luncheon, conference or anything else! For the holidays, it is fun to show the team’s holiday spirit and their ugly sweaters! 

Polls

This is one of the most interactive notions that a company can add to their stories. Polls are underneath Instagram Stickers in the app. A poll sticker allows for feedback on a question or allows for custom answers. Your followers can pick an option and see the poll in real time. 

Does your poll ask if they currently have a new product or service? If they respond no, follow them and send them a message! Another step in the sales funnel. 

Hashtags 

No matter the changes on Instagram, the one thing that remains consistent is the importance of hashtags! Hashtags help to categorize content that relates to that specific hashtag! Even on Instagram Stories, a company needs hashtags. There are two ways to do this. The first is to choose the Instagram Sticker option for a hashtag. 

The only downside to this? You can only use the sticker once per story, but there is a hack for more hashtags! You can click on the “A” in the upper right hand corner that allows for a company to add an extra hashtag to their story.

Now, a company does not need 12 hashtags on their story. One or two is sufficient and is the best option. It is a small spot that a hashtag can fit on. 

Alright, Instagram stories are going to be a part of the marketing strategy, but what will this do for the company? Want to learn how to integrate Instagram marketing services into your overall strategy? Give us a call!