Information for this blog post was sourced from Social Media Today, Social Media Examiner, and Hubspot.

It is no secret that Instagram is moving its focus away from feed posts and towards video content in the form of Stories and Reels. Instagram Stories provide an opportunity to share behind-the-scenes content, tutorials, or speak to your audience in bite-sized chunks that live for only 24 hours or forever in your story highlights. From direct links to interactive stickers and more, we walk you through 3 ways to get the most out of your stories on Instagram.

Add Text to Encourage Viewers to Take Action

Stories are a quick and easy way to share videos and images with your audience, and adding text to your stories is a great way to keep your viewers engaged and inspire them to take action. Adding text to your stories is easy to do.

To access this tool, just click on the "Aa" in the top right corner while posting your story and type your copy. You even have the opportunity to style the text with different fonts and colors to match your brand's personality.

Instagram also has a great captioning tool that allows text to appear in your video posts so viewers who can't listen to your video are still included.

Utilize Interactive Stickers

Did you know Instagram has ways for your audience to engage with you directly in your stories? Enter the stickers tool. Instagram stickers come in several different forms including polls, questions, and countdowns.

Want to find out what your audience prefers for an upcoming product launch or better yet, what kind of content they want to see from you on Instagram? Utilize the polls or questions function.

Polls allow you to create 2 custom answers to be voted on with your viewers. The viewer is even able to see the results of the poll after voting!

Questions allow you to create a custom question or even crowdsource ideas by typing out your question, topic, or idea - the sky (or word count) is really the limit here, and your audience responds back directly in the question box.

Hosting an event or product launch? Utilize the countdown sticker to generate excitement for your launch date!

Include Links

What used to be a feature reserved for verified accounts or ones with over 10,000 followers is now available for everyone on Instagram. This is a great way to drive your audience to a landing page to learn more about what you are promoting.

To utilize the link feature, click on the sticker button and select "link." From here, you will be able to paste or type in the URL for any page.

Conclusion

The many features available can be overwhelming, but if you utilize the three items above, including text, utilizing stickers, and inserting links, you will be well on your way to becoming an Instagram Stories pro.

Resources

Bernazzani, S. (2021, October 7). Instagram stories: What they are and how to make one like a pro. HubSpot Blog. Retrieved March 25, 2022, from https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/instagram-stories

By. (n.d.). Using Instagram link stickers successfully in your stories : Social Media Examiner. Social Media Examiner | Social Media Marketing. Retrieved March 25, 2022, from https://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/using-instagram-link-stickers-successfully-in-your-stories/

Hutchinson, A. (2021, November 11). Instagram provides tips on how to maximize customer engagement with Instagram stories [infographic]. Social Media Today. Retrieved March 25, 2022, from https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/instagram-provides-tips-on-how-to-maximize-customer-engagement-with-instagr/609927/

Hutchinson, A. (2021, October 27). Instagram makes links in stories available to all accounts. Social Media Today. Retrieved March 25, 2022, from https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/instagram-makes-links-in-stories-available-to-all-accounts/609021/