It is possible to see some patterns on a business Instagram page or in the accounts of people who work and invest in Instagram pages, such as influencers. These are usually companies creating design templates based on the colors in their logos, using a certain design pattern on all their posts, creating Instagram blocks with color tones, and special vertical designs prepared for stories.
And these are - although corporate firms want agencies to do every design - nowadays, it is possible to bring eye-catching creative Instagram story ideas to life with many video and photo editors on mobile!
Instagram is essential at any stage of the purchasing process. People leverage Instagram to find out what's trending, research products before purchasing, and determine whether or not to buy—and each of these moments provides advertisers with opportunities to trigger action.
With the Circleboom Publish, you don't have to think about these questions one by one. You can plan your content and give the system time to do its thing. You can also check our best time post on the Instagram article to learn more.
Why Stories Then?
- Instagram has been reported to have almost 1 billion monthly active users as of January 2020.
- Instagram Stories were used by 500 million users every day. It's an interactive feature, and some people check out Stories to see what's going on.
- Every month, over 130 million people interact with shopping posts. People are receptive to shopping posts (which now include shopping on Stories), demonstrating that this function effectively increases product recognition and sales.
- You can talk with the audience and give them behind-the-scenes access to your events, quick how-to guides, stories, or information & stats.
- They're visible for 24 hours, so you can post once a day, twice a day, or multiple times a day without worrying about filling up people's feeds. Also, the stories are more casual, which relieves the pressure of making more carefully planned and edited posts.
- If you wish to find extra web traffic as a company, and Stories are perfect for it. You can do this by including a link in your Instagram post, which is the basis of affiliate marketing!
- A survey, an emoji slider, and funny Instagram story ideas can all help you increase engagement.
Zeynep Morelli
15 Creative Instagram Story Ideas
Now let's look at the aesthetic Instagram story ideas that we all see somewhere, which will be beneficial, especially for interaction and conversion.
1. Educational or Informative Content
With stories, you can inform your audience by introducing new concepts by multiple stories designed particularly for story series and navigate people to swipe left to continue reading like book pages.
Stories are great to dive into in more depth and have fun with your sales material. To come up with ideas for insightful material for articles, consider the following questions:
- What are your products/goods/services?
- What makes them so special?
- What problems do they assist in resolving?
- What distinguishes them from the competition?
2. Swipe-ups for tips or suggestions
If you're a professional cook, you can show off your recipes, and if you're a fashion blogger, you can show off your new dress, link to your site, and even promote the Story. That's a lot better than just putting a photo on your feed!
You can also specifically design Story series to tell a recipe or provide tips on any particular matter. And rather than stuffing all the text in one image, you can create a story for each step or bullet point.
Tell customers how to decorate their homes if you're a furniture company. Build a short exercising story if you're a gym owner. There's always something you can give your followers that they'll appreciate.
3. Behind the Stories
Behind-the-scenes stories are ideal for Instagram Stories because of their casualness. It allows your audience to see what it's like to connect with you. You can share everything, from your preparation to packaging, as long as it is relevant to your business.
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4. Blog/Podcast/Video Announcements
If you've published a new blog, video or podcast and want to announce it, Stories is the ideal place for both guidance and more visibility. You can then add these announcements to the highlights section and create an archive.
You can design according to the story dimensions and give a link to your podcast or blog page.
If you have made a new post in the feed section, you can announce it in the Story section.
5. Q&As and Polls
Ask me anything kind of open-ended question sessions will provide you engagement and help you find creative Instagram story ideas. You can interact with your audience sincerely and get to know them. If you can resolve issues or answer mostly asked questions, you can benefit them too. Or, you can determine a question with a new product launch and ask for their opinion too.
You can make your surveys amusing and entertaining, or you can take a more realistic approach and use them for market analysis. Isn't there a better method out what your supporters want to you than to ask them straightforwardly?
6. Count Down Stories
Countdown stories are again the best choices to create excitement and interest.
For example, you can share a countdown story for a new video or article publication for a short-term event.
Or, as a company, if you are going to launch a product, you can put a longer-term countdown, and you can remind this countdown by repeating the same Story in the meantime.
Countdown stories are also useful for giveaway and contest results - in terms of reporting the deadline - and can come up as creative Instagram story ideas.
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7. Sneak Peeks
If you share sneak peek Instagram Stories before releasing a product or project, you will keep it interesting in your target market. A well-thought-out teasing strategy using Stories will help you boost interest in your product launch and possibly even sales!
H&M's teaser campaign for their latest collection can be seen here.
8. Questionnaires
These designs below, also described as 'This or That' templates, are a perfect way to introduce yourself to your audience.
You could either use a template generated by someone else or use templates to design your own customized questionnaires easily.
However, do not forget to add a blank template to your Story after posting your answers and asking your community to fill it out and tag you!
9. Sharing Reviews & Testimonials
As known by many, you can convert new leads into conversions is by using social evidence. People like to buy from or work for companies they know are good.
If it's screenshots of comments provided by previous clients, samples of emails with encouraging phrases, or even video testimonials, make sure to share them with your community!
10. Introducing Your Team
It would help if you gave your customers a reason to choose you over the many other companies that do or offer what you do.
You will help your followers form a personal and emotional bond by revealing the person(s) behind the product or company. If they feel like they know you, they are far more likely to recognize you when deciding the product for buying!
11. Promoting the latest Instagram post or IGTV video
Since so many users are checking their stories these days, why not try to get them to return to your Instagram account and expand your reach? You can use Instagram stories to share your most recent Instagram post. If you want followers to go to your post in your feed to look and like it, you can mask up the actual post with a sticker or the marker tool to raise interest, leading your followers to tap and see the actual post in your profile is.
12. Promotions and discounts
With an Instagram Story, you can easily generate excitement for your promotion. If you sell clothing, food, beauty items, or small appliances, this is an excellent way to advertise a limited-time deal! Use this chance to promote the company's discounts and sales. Instead of sending out a mass email with coupons, consider delivering them via your Instagram Stories.
Isik Onal
13. Instagram Story Ads
According to Marketing charts data, Instagram Stories ads have been working particularly well for brands recently. According to their study, in Q3 2020, Stories ads produced 35% of impressions and 29% of overall Instagram ad spending for brands. The impression that Stories ads have a lower-than-average CPM given their recent rise is also noteworthy.
Another interesting Instagram figure is how many businesses are running Facebook and Instagram advertising simultaneously. In reality, for brands running campaigns on both channels, Instagram contributed to 33% of Facebook's marketing budget and 36% of impressions.
So, why not trying Instagram Story ads?
They will look like below as Sponsored content while people swiping left to see what other people they follow shared, and your ad will pop up to the relevant audience thanks to features offered by targeting.
14. Using Before and after photos on Stories
Quick, easy, and you can share multiple before and after images without them getting boring. If you're short on ideas, this is a great place to start. It is quite beneficial for certain businesses – such as decorators, personal trainers, dietitians to show off their success through client photos.
15. Timelapses
A timelapse of a certain process such as cooking, painting, decorating or making your product in a workshop or factory may increase engagement. People enjoy watching things come together, particularly when it can be done in seconds right in front of their eyes. Sharing a timelapse is a perfect way to demonstrate the importance of your services and demonstrate that it's more than just the end-product.
Timing Matters, Schedule Your Content!
All these suggestions will bring you engagement and bring you one step closer to the content your audience will love. Of course, customization and brand-specific tailoring are necessary. Creative effort is necessary for each account and each brand.
Content is the king. We understood and learned this.
What about timing?
Producing both feed and story contents, sharing them simultaneously, and controlling the sharing times are as important as content. At what times is your audience most active? What about your working hours with these busy times, that is, times that will bring engagement and conversion?
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Before You Go
Look at the below Instagram Story sample product launch plan to get a more vivid idea of using all the ideas mentioned above.
- Begin sharing content that generates interest in your product or service, such as inquire about the answers to the questions that your product or service provides.
- Using the Questionnaire or Quiz stickers to ask more open-ended questions and tease a new product coming shortly.
- Present followers who sign up in your Story a discount code or early access.
- Start your countdown a week or a few days before your launch date and use the same Countdown sticker every day.
- Think reserving a product for a Giveaway before it goes live.
- Seed the product with influencers and tell them to start blogging about it with the launch date.
- Use your Stories on that day to drive traffic to your website or Insta Store. Document the whole day with videos and photos of reviews, testimonials, any celebration event content too.
Isik Onal
Zeynep Morelli
