New york, USA - May 5, 2022: Instagram stories menu on smartphone screen close up view
There are many social and advertising channels and each of these channels has a variety of formats. These formats always have their own specific requirements. It’s also common for these formats to have a specific style, purpose and cost. This article goes into further detail on Instagram Stories.
What are Instagram Stories?
Instagram Stories are short images or videos that appear in 9:16 slideshow format but are not shared to the Instagram feed. Stories only last for 24 hours and each slide is typically 15 seconds long. Stories are great for in-the-moment and behind-the-scenes content.
When you post a story, a colourful ring will appear around your profile picture. Stories can be viewed by tapping a profile picture with a ring around it. This can appear via your clickable profile picture in the following places:
- On a profile page
- At the top of the feed
- In the feed next to posts
- In Direct inbox
They are typically less polished than the professional videos or photography you’d expect to find brightening up your Instagram grid. This means that whilst still on brand with your messaging, there’s less of an expectation for the aesthetic to match your grid. This is partly because you are encouraged to use Instagram’s tools for engagement, which give you limits on customisation.
For example, you can add stickers, links and even polls to your stories that are designed to increase engagement from your followers.
As of 2022, stories in video format can be up to 1 minute long. Images will be shown for 15 seconds. All stories can be paused by tapping and holding on the screen.
How to use Instagram Stories
Instagram Stories are created and posted within the app using images or videos within your phone’s library. You will need to ensure you have all of the story content downloaded to your device before sharing.
If you’re looking to add stickers such as quizzes, polls, hashtags, location tags etc, you must do this within the Instagram app immediately before posting. It’s a very manual process but it makes your content more interactive and more likely to increase engagement.
Because Stories don’t clog up the feed, you can post as many stories as you like without spamming your audience.
You can also tag accounts in your stories or be tagged in other people’s stories. When this happens, the person tagged will receive a DM in their inbox to notify them, with the option to re-share this story to their own profile.
You can also share feed posts as stories by tapping the share button in the feed. Sharing a post to your story can help increase awareness of your post.
What will Stories do? Who will they reach?
Stories are designed to capture what goes on between your regular posts and videos. It will show your followers behind-the-scenes and more personal content and is the perfect method to encourage DMs from your followers. It’s great for humanising your brand for the people that have already followed you, helping move them closer to taking action.
Stories very rarely reach people beyond your followers. You can see who has viewed your story and interacted with it in your story analytics, accessed by the menu button at the bottom corner.
Instagram Story Examples
The four stories below are taken from our archive (accessible on the Instagram app).
This first screenshot is an example of how you can use photography and interactive features such as a quiz to engage your audience. In this example, DS.Emotion were on a photoshoot at a show home.
In this example, Yorkshire Children’s Charity had reshared a story of our team helping out at one of their events. We reshared their story to give Yorkshire Children’s Charity and ourselves more exposure.
In this third example, we have shared a feed post from SME Climate Hub to show solidarity with their cause and spread their message – something which we feel strongly about at DS.Emotion.
The final example is a screenshot of a video taken on a mobile device. It’s clear from the video quality that it is not a professional video shoot, but for Instagram Stories, this content is acceptable.
You’ll notice that across these examples, Instagram puts its own stamp on the limited aesthetic of the stories through its fonts, empty space and stickers. It’s much more difficult to be unique in stories – this has to come through in the content and value you offer.
Recommended requirements
Aspect ratio: 9:16
Resolution: 1,080 x 1,920 pixels
Max file size: 30 MB