Looking back over the past year there have been several major Instagram updates. Leveraging this social network to its fullest potential with these new updates is important for visibility and business growth.
Instagram is one of the most used social networks worldwide making it an essential social platform to be included in your social media marketing strategy. In this article, you’ll find out 7 interesting ways you can take advantage of Instagram stories highlights to drive more traffic. However, before we dive into that, here’s how to create them.
Table of Contents:
- How to create Instagram story highlights
- How to edit your Instagram story highlight
- 7 Compelling ways to use Instagram story highlights to drive more traffic
- #1 Feature your latest blog posts
- #2 Announce new products
- #3 Showcase your other social media channels
- #4 Offer valuable and shoppable content
- #5 Highlight your latest competitions
- #6 Showcase product reviews
- #7 Share user-generated content
- Brands that are doing it right
How to create Instagram Story Highlights
Creating Instagram story highlights is fairly easy and can be done within a few minutes. To begin, first, open the Instagram app and either swipe to the right or click the camera icon in the top left corner.
You’ll then see the camera screen with a few options such as Type, Live, Normal, Boomerang, Superzoom etc. If you don’t have pre-made content, go ahead and play with the camera options. If you have content that you have already created for your story highlights, swipe up and then browse for the content.
Once you’ve found the content and clicked on it, you’ll have the option to add text, emojis, GIFs and if you’ve got an audience over 10,000 and your account is a business profile, you’ll be eligible for adding hyperlinks.
If you are happy with the outcome, you’re ready to add it to your story. Click “Send to >” and then choose “Your Story”. Alternatively, you can also click the “Your Story” shortcut option next to the Save option in the bottom left.
This will add the content to your Instagram story. Now, you’ll need to visit your Instagram profile. Underneath your bio, you should see a circle with a plus sign inside and the word “New” below. Click that and browse for your story.
After selecting the content, you’ll be able to click “Next” and then proceed with giving your Instagram Story Highlight a name. You also have the ability to edit the cover of the highlight to make it more attractive and keep the theme consistent on your profile.
And there you go. That’s how to create a story highlight on Instagram.
*If you are creating custom content for your highlight, you should be aware of the Instagram stories highlights dimensions. 1242 x 2208 pixels should be suitable.
How to edit your Instagram Story Highlight
If you’ve already created an Instagram Story Highlight but have more content you need to add or even remove, then it’s very simple to do so. Just head on over to your Instagram profile and click on the story highlight you would like to edit.
In the bottom right you’ll see three dots with “More” below. Click that and then choose “Edit Highlight”, this will allow you to edit the name and cover along with adding and removing Highlights.
Now we’ve covered how to create and edit them, let’s take a look to see how Instagram’s recent update will help drive more traffic.
7 Compelling Ways to Use Instagram Story Highlights to Drive More Traffic
#1 Feature your latest blog posts
Utilising Instagram story highlights to promote your new blog posts is a brilliant strategy for generating more traffic to your website. You should create an engaging image and add a hyperlink to the blog post. I’ve been doing this on my Instagram for articles that I’ve written in the past both on SkillsLab and other sites, including my travel blog. This has resulted in more referral traffic from the social network platform.
Another option could be creating short blog posts within your highlights which then link to the full article. This could work quite well as it may generate curiosity and increases trust in the quality of content you share.
Previously Instagram only allowed you to include a single link in your profile, this forced many users to decide whether they want to send people to their website or a specific product page. With this recent update, you’ll now be able to link to multiple pages on the web.
One way of taking advantage of this is by creating a highlight announcing your new products, services and features with hyperlinks directly to those specific pages. Creating compelling content is important to consider when doing this.
#3 Showcase your other social media channels
If your business has other social media channels it would be worthwhile showcasing those on your profile. This will drive traffic to those channels allowing you to build a larger following and stay in touch with your audience across multiple social networks.
If you share exclusive content on your other social media channels you should definitely include that within your highlight as this will create interest and curiosity.
#4 Offer valuable and shoppable content
Sharing informative content to your audiences such as eBooks, videos and other assets is another effective way to increase traffic. This is also the perfect strategy for growing your email list too.
Another way to utilize Instagram story highlights is by offering shoppable content where you share specific products or guides in your highlight with a hyperlink to the shoppable product page, generating sales directly from your Instagram.
#5 Highlight your latest competitions
Promoting your latest competition, giveaway or campaigns to your followers can be very time-consuming as you will have to constantly post about them. With thousands of images and videos being posted on Instagram every second you can imagine how difficult it might be for them to perform well.
Utilizing highlights will allow you to keep your audience updated easily. Since highlights are enabled for everyone who sees your profile this is the ideal way to promote the campaign effectively.
Taking advantage of this feature will allow you to increase engagement which will result in your account ranking fairly high on home feeds, hashtags and of course the explore page.
#6 Showcase product reviews
Sharing your product reviews and testimonials increases social trust, so applying this with links to the specific content or products of that review will help increase traffic and potential sales. This may also create some buzz and encourage more customers to leave reviews.
Screenshots and video reviews are perfect for this however you could also create custom content to make the highlight more attractive.
#7 Share user-generated content
User-generated content is becoming more popular and is one of the best performing types of content. Consumers love to be featured by brands in a positive way so utilizing user-generated content will not only increase engagement but you will likely see more traffic to your website.
When considering this type of content it is very important you acquire permission from the original content creator and credit them whenever the content is used. This will keep you safe and will allow you to build great connections.
Instagram has given us all the ability to generate more traffic — especially via the use of highlights. It now comes down to the quality of content and how creative you can be. If you are not utilizing the platform’s latest updates, don’t expect much growth and traffic.
Brands doing it right
To give you some inspiration, check out the below brands that are taking advantage of Instagram Stories Highlights.
GoPro:
If you’ve read a few of my articles covering Instagram, I’m usually always featuring something from GoPro. The reason being, they know exactly what to do when it comes to Instagram marketing. Once again, they’ve created a few very good Instagram Stories Highlights. The one above promotes their GoProPlus subscription service where they offer various benefits, including the “You Break it, We’ll Replace It”.
Once you swipe up, you’ll be directed to their landing page that covers everything you need to know about the service along with the option to become a subscriber for $4.99/month.
BBC News:
The latest Instagram Stories Highlight from BBC News features various clips and images for when Mark Zuckerberg was in Congress for more questioning. In each of the content they added to the Highlight, they’ve included a link to the article, driving more traffic.
