Instagram story ideas and best practices to grow your followers and business

Introduction

Why should you use Instagram Stories for business? Is it a helpful marketing strategy? Can it grow your business? As per a digital agency survey, you can quickly increase your engagement by 2-3x more and grow your followers. In addition, 58% of the audience accepts that they would buy a product or take a service after watching Instagram stories. You only need to know a few best practices for Instagram stories to achieve excellent marketing results. So, if you are exploring some blogs for creative Instagram story ideas, this one is for you.

 

You can easily make the most out of your Instagram Stories with creative story ideas. There is no doubt about it, as many big brands are nailing their marketing campaigns with the proper use of Instagram stories. They have made it the central point of their brand and content marketing strategy.

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Let’s begin!

3 Instagram Story Ideas To Grow Your Followers and Business Visibility

This blog post will navigate you through some simple yet effective ideas to increase your followers and boost engagement. Don’t worry about algorithms because you will always be on top. Using Instagram stories creates short content for a short time but is more engaging than your wall feeds. So, it is a simple calculation.

For example, try this best practice and curate many ideas utilizing various Instagram Story stickers. Stickers would give you more engagement, resulting in more views.

 

Let’s start.

#1. Instagram Stickers.

This Instagram Story ideas using Stickers are one of the easiest method and best practices to get more views and boost engagement. Let’s understand a few cool ones.

  1. Create Polls using Poll Sticker: Ask a question first thing in the morning and generate curiosity around what you will post today or talk about on your Instagram story today. Example: Would you like to see my review of this product/service? Want a sneak peek into our studio? Yes or No?

 

    1. Play the “This or That” game using Poll Sticker: Using the same Poll sticker, you can also play this game and ask your audience to engage with you. You can also ask if your audience is willing to get a sneak peek of behind the scenes for your product launch, etc. You can create more Instagram Story Ideas using the same, showing behind the scenes for your audience. An excellent way to increase your followers count. Engage your current audience and build trust for your brand.

      For example, which service would you prefer? Or, what is your color choice for a product? Would you like to walk through with us behind the scene?

    2. Play the “True or False” Fun Fact game using Poll Sticker: You can also play fun facts games like ‘True or false’ using Poll Sticker for your business. Take any product or service and ask for a fun fact from your audience.
    3. “See a Photo of____” using Q&A Sticker: This is one of the viral Instagram Story ideas that businesses leveraged to the fullest. You can ask your audience if they want to see a photo of something from your workstation or product.

      For example, Would you like to see my desk? Once the votes come out. You can easily create a nice cool and crisp video using Instagram video creators and post it online, showcasing your desk or workstation.

  • Instagram Sessions with the audience using Question Sticker box: Another great way to increase your follower count is to use the Question Sticker box for your Q&A sessions. Post questions like – Ask us anything? Or, any opinion-related questions such as – What is your favorite product and why?
  • Quiz Sticker: Quizzes have been an excellent engagement idea, and you can leverage the same for Instagram Stories for your business. One game that is still in the leap is – the “Get to Know Me” game. Here, you can ask your audience various questions about your business, product or service, and even industry segment.

#2. Product or Service Tutorials.

You can easily engage your audience by displaying your product features and how-to’s, personal tips, and product demonstrations. Create a fun edit using the Instagram video editor and post on your stories.

#3. Challenge.

This business idea is among the most fun way to increase your followers count. Additionally,  your audience will participate in a challenge and help you get more views, add new followers and increase excellent visibility on Instagram. You can start some Challenges related to your brand or service.

For example, take a selfie on our _________ outfit and tag us! Fashion brands can do some challenges with makeup hacks. Example: Show us the best eyeliner wing and get a hamper. Furthermore, Dine at our _________ restaurant, tag a family selfie, and the best one will get free lunch for a member of 5!

Instagram Story Best Practices

A few more things that you can do are use IG videos and use the best practice of understanding and inputting your product links correctly. Create a consecutive sequence for your Stories. You can create a hook in every story for the next one. It is another excellent growth hack to increase and build your Instagram audience.

 

One of the best practices is to shoot your videos always vertically. After that, edit them using a professional Instagram video editor as it comes with features loaded for Instagram Stories for every business or vertical.

Additionally, there are more creative stickers that you can utilize being added continuously by Instagram. Therefore, always stay updated and use all the Stickers in one or the other Instagram Story ideas. Another best practice is to be very careful and not to overwhelm your Instagram Stories with too many stickers at the same time.

Also, consistency is the key to getting more followers. Therefore, another best practice for Instagram stories for Businesses is to stay on top of all trending marketing campaigns. Follow some great Instagram Influencers and businesses like Nike, SEMrush, etc. These brands focus on using all the creative tools offered and launched by Instagram.

A few best practices are shared above, like engagement with other brands, influencers, content posting consistency, and publishing frequencies, etc. Out of so many great features, one feature that gives you a further creative edge is using Highlights! Create an excellent catalog of your Highlighted Instagram Stories. Check out SEMrush’s Instagram page, for example.

Last but not least, check analytics and understand what works well for you! The final bonus tip is creating and using branded GIFs for your business and brand. It would increase your discoverability and help you reach a wider audience.

Wrap Up

Of course, there are many more Instagram Business Ideas, such as Storytelling for your brand’s success. You can share the products before and after. Another one is Throwbacks! The fun part is that you can always merge these ideas. Easily create your unique trend for your business and grow your audience manifold.

Instagram stories have given so much creative freedom to creators. It has boomed the creator’s economy. Yes, there can be concerns initially while publishing your first few sets of Stories. There can be trial and error, but you will gain confidence for your next Instagram Stories content marketing endeavors by sticking to the standard best practices and formats that we covered above. With that, we wrap it up!

Comment your best strategy and business idea for Instagram Story.