Why Stories Should Be Part of Your Social Media Marketing Strategy
Even if you haven't started creating your own stories on Instagram and Facebook, you've probably consumed at least a few by now. They're pretty hard to miss since they sit front and center at the top of the page when you open up your app!
If your feed is anything like mine, you probably have just a few friends on Facebook that are dominating stories. On Instagram, you're probably seeing a lot more story content, but I bet you often see the same people over and over again. Take a moment and think about it. Who do you see all the time doing Facebook stories? And who do you see all the time doing Instagram stories?
It was probably pretty easy to come up with a few names, right?
This is exactly why you need to be adding stories into your social media marketing strategy. Even though Facebook now reported they have 150 million daily active users and Instagram has about 300 million, the people who are capitalizing on stories and being consistent are cutting through the noise and staying top of mind.
And your brand can do it, too.
Instagram and Facebook stories are available for both personal and business type profiles/pages. You can also link the two together so when you create a story on Instagram, it will automatically push to the corresponding profile/page on Facebook. Pretty neat, huh?
If you're read this far and are still hesitating about using stories, here are five more reasons why you need to make stories part of your social media marketing strategy.
1) Stories Let You Beat the Algorithm
Want a sure-fire way to increase the odds your content actually shows up in people's feeds? Do a story. Stories are not algorithmic, but time-based. So spreading your stories out throughout the day increases the chances someone will see your smiling face (or your brand's awesome logo!) hanging out at the top of their feed.
2) Stories Are Fun
Stories are just straight up fun. There's stickers and polls and gifs. There's face filters and boomerangs. And there are tons of tips and tricks out there that will let you make your stories even more personalized. I bookmarked this fabulous article about some Instagram story hacks because I did not know most of these! The more stories I consume, the more excited I get about all of the possibilities!
3) Stories Let You Add Personality to Your Brand
Similar to point 2, stories let you humanize and add personality to your brand. Want to share a funny behind-the-scenes pic or video, but don't want to mess up the curated look of your brand's feed on Instagram? Throw it in a story! Want to get your followers interacting with your brand? Do a poll or use the new emoji slider on Instagram to get people to responding to your content! You can also use stories to drive people back to your main feed on Instagram or Facebook by taking a screenshot of your profile, adding a funny sticker or gif to cover up the most recent post, and making a story out of it!
4) Stories Are Where Consumer Attention is Going
I can't remember what podcast it was (maybe an episode of Social Media Examiner?), but recently I was listening to someone talking about how more and more people are just consuming stories on Instagram and not actually scrolling through their feed. The reason? It automatically keeps playing and moving you from story to story. This could represent a shift in consumer attention, especially as the number of daily active users of both Facebook and Instagram stories keeps growing.
And even though I've been focusing on Instagram and Facebook, let's not forget about Snapchat, the original stories platform! And Youtube also has a stories product.
5) Your Competitors Probably Aren't Doing Them....Yet
Lastly, your competitors might not be doing stories yet. Or doing them consistently. Which presents you with a major opportunity to make a land grab and boost your brand over theirs. I have over 1,000 friends on my personal Facebook and follow who knows how many pages, but when I do stories for my own clients, I often see their stories hanging around throughout the day. And it's not that I'm so great at stories right now...I'm still figuring this out, too. But I'm more convinced than ever that stories represent a major opportunity for brands to make a play for attention. (Do I sound like Gary Vaynerchuk yet?)
Ok. So hopefully, I've done my job and convinced you that you need to be giving stories a try. But you might be feeling a little overwhelmed with what to post. Well, as always, I'm here to help!
Grab my free download below with 25 ideas you can use to help you get started creating stories for Instagram and Facebook!
