A few weeks ago, Snapchat launched memories which seemed to be taking a stab at Instagram. Instagram quickly fired back by launching Instagram Stories a few days ago and it completely changed the game.
When it comes to building your brand, here are a few things to consider about this new update!
FYI: Your story is only up for 24 hours and each clip can only be 10 seconds long.
PROS
Back to the Basics
Social Media is all about creating relatable content to help humanize your brand. When Instagram first started, brands were sharing live content however as they progressed, their content became more aesthetically planned and less real-time. Sharing live behind the scenes content and showcasing your team is a great way to prove that your brand is built on strong values with great people who love what they do.
Live Events
Once again, you’ve been working very hard to build a great aesthetic for your brand and you know that most followers have come for the quality of your page. It’s often hard for brands to showcase on going events when it has to go through a team of editors before going live. Using Instagram Stories is a great way to showcase events that are happening right now but may not be relevant in the future. It also saves you from disrupting the look of your page overall.
Build on an Existing Community
Most brands quickly jumped on the Snapchat bandwagon just to realize it’s extremely hard to get their community to follow them on yet another platform. Even if the content was great. If your brand is still working on a plan to get onto Snapchat, worry no more. You can now get started sharing live stories with a community you’ve already built on instagram!
Slide Into the DMs.
You can now have more control over who can slide into your DMs. You can specifically choose who can view your story and make sure to start conversations with the right people! Unlike Snapchat where you could easily be getting messages from random and anonymous accounts.
CONS
Less Likes.
Stories could potentially decrease engagement for those who have been working hard on gathering large amounts of likes and comments directly on their pictures. Consumers may be drawn to watching stories sequentially versus scrolling down a profile to like pictures.
For the time being, finding the correct influencers to represent your brand may also be tricky as you won’t have access to any story view metrics.
The Face of Your Brand.
In most cases, live video means, humans. If your Facebook and Instagram accounts are highly image and graphic focused it can be tricky to find the right person to represent your brand in real time who will be great on camera and remain relevant over time.
Potential Follower Loss.
Now that this new update has rolled out many users feel like they might be following too many people. They might follow you because they really like your pictures but didn’t necessarily need to see more or simply enjoyed the follow back factor. However, it’s important to remember that QUALITY OVER QUANTITY is always the best policy. Better having fewer followers who are really into your brand than ghost followers who aren’t really interested in finding out more about you. *It’s important that your Instagram Story content stay relevant to your feed. You wouldn’t want to loose your followers’ interest*
The next question we have here, is with Facebook rolling out emotions and Instagram focusing on views, what will become the value of a Like?
