Useful tips for using Instagram Story Highlights effectively

Last Updated on February 24, 2022 by Andrew

Regardless of the niche your brand covers, using Instagram stories should be vital to your marketing strategy. When you use them correctly, they can help spread the word about your business more effectively and quickly compared to the normal Instagram picture post, and showcase your products and services to a larger audience.

At least 500 million people use the feature daily, and they will want to look out for new trends. According to a recent study, 58% of people state that they become more interested in a brand or product after viewing it in the Stories feature, and about 50% of them go ahead to visit websites to purchase products afterward.

Instagram stories disappear after 24 hours after posting, but they appear at the top of the Instagram app instead of the feed. To make the content interesting and memorable, they include elements like filters, polls, and stickers, so using them effectively will guarantee significant growth to your business – much like getting likes from real Instagrammers, especially influencers, does to your brand reputation.

However, this creates a problem – saving these stories so that they last beyond 24 hours, and this is where Highlights come in. They are stories that you save to your profile so that people can access them after the 24 hours are over. You can save them in different categories as well, so your audiences can see the content type they are most interested in. They prolong the life of a story, so they can still get engagement even days, weeks, or months later.

With this in mind, it is best to know how to use them effectively, which are:

Showing off collections

Among the best methods to use the highlights is showing off your collections. It is worth considering creating a Highlight for each part of your business, such as a ‘Shop’ category that shows all your product varieties. 

Additionally, you can create a link to the new ‘Instagram Shopping’ feature for your business in the Highlights category, or incorporate link stickers to redirect your customers to the collection landing page.

Using it for company announcements

This is a great way to show audiences the changes you plan to make for your business. This is very helpful due to the people who may not see your initial announcement, as they can still access this information and see the milestones your brand has achieved, like new locations or subscriber milestones.

Give educational content and resources

You can easily rely on Instagram stories for anything, including educational content. As a brand, you should also do the same and inform your audiences, such as sharing promotional graphics, links that direct them to educational resources such as podcasts, eBooks, and videos, or your blog content.

Depending on your industry or business, the educational content youshare will differ. An instance would be giving links to recent blog posts or favorite recipes if you run a catering business brand, and SaaS companies sharing useful posts or information on how you can use their software. Gyms can share their tips on healthy routines or workout plans, and the content type goes on depending on what your audience prefers.

Event promotion

Highlights are also excellent methods of promoting recurring or upcoming events to boost attendee numbers, as well as promote any other events your business connects to. Doing events that your business attends or hosts is excellent in showing the things you care about, and also promoting activism while doing so.

Answering user questions

Use these highlights to answer questions that your audience may send in – you can even create ‘FAQ’ story highlights to make them easier to access. To encourage engagement, create Instagram stories and add a ‘Question’ sticker to allow users to send you their questions, and either type these answers on blank or photo backgrounds or record yourself answering the questions.

Highlight testimonials and reviews

Whenever the chance arises, it is always a good idea to show your happy customers, which encourages more people to sign up. For instance, you can post short clips of customers narrating positive experiences, or create interesting edits of several testimonials.

In conclusion, Story highlights are a great way to encourage more engagement from your audience, bring new people in, and spread information about the strength of your brand. The more interesting you make them the more people will want to engage with you.