It’s a really big deal to know how to use Instagram for your advantage. The more opportunity we have to reach clients, the more we should know how to use these services! Instagram is one of the largest social networks, and the reach is incredible! This episode talks all about authentically engaging with those clients in a very real way and making them feel a personal relationship. Enjoy learning how to use Instagram stories for your business!
The Rise of Instagram Stories
I’m gonna give you a little background. Instagram Stories are Instagram’s response to Snapchat. One of the main premises of Snapchat is the story features, where they’re able to somebody able to take a like a video or a picture of what’s going on in their day and share that really casually to friends. Over the course of time, we’ve seen the slow decline of people on Instagram over the course of past few year. Snapchat has always been looming in the distance, this new social media platform. And then I saw a trend where people were going away from Instagram, because all you could do is post your photos, which is fun, but it’s not very personal.
Now that Instagram has stories, things have changed. Now Instagram has an 800 million person user base with over 300 million people using Instagram Stories daily, which is almost billion people. A seventh of the world is on Instagram. So if you aren’t using Instagram stories, it’s a real you’re missing out on a whole lot users that are 25 years of age and spend about 32 minutes a day on Instagram. And a big part of that a big reason is because of the stories feature. It’s kind of crazy to think about the immediate impact Instagram Stories had on other social media platforms like Snapchat. Instagram stories have led to a 15%-40% decline in Snapchat stories. 40% that’s huge, right? Many influencers are moving from Snapchat. They still are posting on Snapchat, but they’re mostly posting on Instagram stories. Instagram Stories should be a huge part of your business because you can use it to reach a whole different audience. Because we all know there’s an algorithm that affects our posting, and the amount of people that view our posting and can see it.
And so because of that, we need to figure out different ways to engage with users and our followers. And the people that we want to engage with an Instagram Stories is a great way to beat that algorithm, right? So as we talk today, we’re talking about the stories and features in general, because using those features really help to benefit you in the long run. One of the biggest things that Instagram does is putting out new features and new things for us to use. Using them directly benefits us. And so make sure that you’re out there posting on stories, even small things.
How Instagram has changed us
Katheryn and I post to stories quite often and use polls. Using features like polls affects your algorithm. And so you want to make sure that you’re using those polls, because people want to interact with those polls. People want to be apart of those polls and I’ve noticed when I use a poll, we reach away more people and get more people messaging us about it. We’re immediately creating conversation and we’re creating relationships, which is a huge part of building your business through Instagram. It’s so interesting, because we think that because we have our phones and we’re on these platforms, that we’re no longer social with people in person. But that’s not the case, it’s just a new way of conversing because technology has changed our lives.
Cultural Differences
So it has become the way in which most people, kids middle age people (25 to 35 year olds), socialize when they go out with their friends. So any way we can help to create that social atmosphere is a big deal. And so creating those polls is really helpful because we’re starting to engage with people more. Katherine and I are always creating polls that show and talk about our different cultures, Katheryn is a white girl who grew up in like the suburbs and I’m black and grew up in LA. So we talk about these things because there’s different cultural norms we have. And people love it and it cracks me up because people messaged us, and they laugh. Be sure that you’re using these features because they help facilitate, build and foster relationships and because this community is so important. It’s not just a social platform that we’re on, we’re also trying to facilitate a community around your brand, which is a really, really, really big deal.
Video On Instagram
A couple of things that I really, really love about Instagram Stories is that it also allows for you to showcase some more of your work. I always say that Instagram is great because it allows you to have your portfolio on your feed and your personality in your story. But in also doing that, the story also enables you to be able to reach a broader audience with your work. So for us, when we do shoots, we create a video on Final Cut Pro that has some of our work in it. You can also use the app Splice where you can actually put photos or videos together and it puts it to music and then you can upload that to your story. And so there’s just different ways that allow you to engage with different like a broader reach of your clients with your work. So we make sure that we use the Instagram stories to feature our work as well. And because we have 10,000 users were able to use the swipe up features, which is huge.
Linktree
Most people who do not have the swipe up feature place links in the bio of their profile and direct people there. I would suggest using a thing called Linktree. You pay make an account for free or pay $6 a month for it to completely customize the branding. And once you do that you can actually put in different links and titles. So for example, if you go to the Anchor and Veil Instagram account and look at our bio you can click on the Linktree link. Then it’s going to pop up with five or six different links that you can actually click on, so it makes it really nice. The great thing about Linktree is it’s a you can brand it with your colors and put multiple links by just adding one link in your bio. Which makes it really easy for you to be able to reach that potential client or reach that follower and send them to a couple of different places rather than changing your link over and over. But for those who have over 10,000 followers, you can use the swipe up feature.
Highlights
The other thing I love about the Instagram stories is that now they’ve created the highlight feature, which is really cool. We have a lot of things that we want to engage with others about. We have the podcast, we have the YouTube channel, we have our work and more. We have all kinds of things that we want people to be able to engage with on our Instagram page. So with that being said, when you create your stories, you can click on the little highlight button down at the bottom (it’s a little heart with a circle on it). Once you do that, you can create a highlight that is actually put onto your profile. Whenever you have this on your profile, you have to be careful because it does minimize the amount of photos on your profile when somebody comes to your page, so if you’re really trying to gain a following, this may not be something you want to do.
Let’s say you’re not a photographer, let’s say maybe you’re a florist. Or let’s say maybe you do papers. Or maybe whatever you do, you can do some really cool stuff. With this highlight feature you can show behind the scenes and maybe more personality and keep it at the top of your profile. For photographers, you can also add videos of you editing like maybe walking through the process of some of their favorite shots.
Stories and Going Live
The great thing about the stories and going live is that they immediately pop up first on somebody’s feed. So I like that I’m constantly the top of somebody feed, especially if they’re engaging with me a bunch. Most of the times when I put up a new story, it’s there for a while and I try to put up new stories throughout the day, so it’s constantly refreshed back to the first story on their line of all their stories. If you just have one, then it gets pushed back over and over as people create new ones. But if you post stories throughout the day, then you’re constantly pushed back to the f first story on their row. And so that creates really great brand awareness. Understanding that is so key. And what works even better is if you go live, you stay first for a while, like you really do and that’s a big deal. There’s plenty of things you can do with Instagram stories, so many ways for you to beat the algorithm and to be able to expose yourself to your clients in a different way. And also another way for you to reach clients that you potentially couldn’t reach in the past. So it’s a really big deal that Instagram has released this story feature, because before we relied on the algorithm, or we relied on people seeing our photos and trying to relate with us. But now because we have the stories option, we are more likely to be able to engage with a broader audience. And we’re more likely to engage with them on a personal level than ever before. Because we no longer have to screw up the feeds that you guys curate so well. Or we no longer have to try to decide on that one minute post that tries to put our personality on on display. Or we no longer have to try to post a really nice caption to try to gain their attention what you want to do those things. But now your personality can really come out in your stories, which is a big, big deal. So make sure that you guys are using stories because it’s a really, really awesome opportunity
The Psychology of Instagram
One other thing I want to talk about is also the psychology behind posting these stories for engagement. When we post a photo or a story, we are actually offering up the opportunity for people to engage. So when somebody posts something, the reason why they post is to be engaged with. I know when somebody posts something on Instagram, they want to either have it liked or they want to be commented on. And so when they post a story, it’s almost asking for it to be engaged with. And it’s no longer weird to slide in the DMs. Remember, that used to be a weird thing in the beginning. But now since stories exist, it’s almost invited now. So when somebody post something like their cute dog or cute cat, of course, I’m going to give that a like and comment the cute cat eyes heart emoji. And they’re gonna talk back to me and be like, “Oh my gosh, I know, it’s so cute, isn’t it?”. And right there, you’re creating engagement, which is creating trust and building trust. Because they say, if people like you, they’ll listen to you. But if they trust you, they’ll do business with you. So the big deal with that is you’re gaining trust, when you’re commenting and you’re engaging and you’re interacting with each other over and over and over. And that’s a big deal when it comes for them to make a decision. We want to engage with them emotionally, not just on a business stand firm standpoint. We want to engage with them on a very personal level and Instagram Stories allows you to do that. Don’t feel weird about saying something that you really like, or that you connect with this person, or just saying hey when somebody put something on their story It’s a big deal that you’re able to do that and it’s not weird, so make sure you take advantage of it.
