Instagram stories will be turning two this year. This relatively new feature celebrates more than 400 million active users, perhaps a sign of success. Brands and commercial profiles are the major beneficiaries of this product. It made it easy for most Instagram users to increase their reach, widen their customers, and increase engagement. If you haven’t discovered how to achieve this, check out the tips below.

1. Use the Swipe Up Feature

Business accounts with more than 10k followers can enjoy several business Instagram features such as the swipe up option. if you haven’t achieved such a following, it is a good growth aim goal. For those with this feature, you can add it at the end of your stories to direct users swipe up for a specific call to action. There are even follower boosters that can help achieve that goal that will unlock more features.

2. Include “Tap for more” prompt

This is simple, and straightforward Instagram stories feature. From your Instagram stories, add some text and an arrow prompting followers to tap on the right side of the Instagram story to view your next story. Stories take a maximum of 15 seconds before automatically moving forward. So why does this matter?

Well, watching Instagram stories in a sequence is a passive experience. The more your followers sit and watch, the less they concentrate on the content, making them likely to exit the sequence. Therefore, prompting your followers to tap for more can help accomplish four things.

Gives users a sense of control. They will no longer be bystanders but are involved with story progression.
It triggers the viewers to change from a passive to an active state.
Users get excited about what’s coming next.
It increases the chances that users will tap or swipe up for more about the story.

To capture your follower’s attention with this feature, set up your Instagram stories with teasing information. For example, you can ask your followers questions that capture their interest. They will want to keep watching out for answers. You can add the tap for more feature in several ways. You can have it with a right-pointing emoji, use a text tool, or design a screen using a third-party tool.

3. Post Save-Worthy Content

Another good way of getting your Instagram followers to engage through Instagram stories is by delivering valuable content on your stories. Save-worthy content could be in the form of branded wallpapers, lists, and any other creative content. This will probably prompt the followers to screenshot and save them.

As for the branded wallpapers, you can design several attractive themes for mobile phones, share them for your followers to screenshot, and use them in their phones. You can include a slide just before your wallpapers to notify your followers about your forthcoming posts. You can have a statement like “are you ready for some wallpapers? Get ready to take screenshots.”

The other technique is sharing a list. People certainly love lists. Lists are straightforward, are practical, and provide easy-to-digest information. Depending on your niche, there are several lists you can share on your Instagram stories for your audience to save. For instance, you can share a checklist slide with step-by-step guides about a specific item.

4. Post Back and Forth Conversation on Your Story

Using the Instagram question sticker is a good method of soliciting feedback from your Instagram followers. A basic way of doing this is taking a photo of yourself and using the question sticker, prompt your followers to ask you anything that comes to their mind. Besides increasing engagement, it shows followers that you are willing to pay attention to their input.

If you make use of this feature strategically, you can unlock important insights that can help you understand better about your audience’s persona. Some of the questions you can try out include;

Ask me anything – you can ask your audience to send their questions. This makes your audience feel more connected and humanizes your brand.
What are your challenges with “X” – asking your followers about their challenges with a particular item will enable you to identify topics to cover in your next story and find ideas for your new products.
“Hello everyone, today is “X” day! Ask me your questions.” – This is a slight variation of the second question. Soliciting for questions about specific topics can help you find your middle funnel content.
“What do you want me to write about next?” – This is quite simple. Ask your followers the kind of content they would want you to create. Getting this feedback will help you understand what your audience expects from you.

5. Increase Time Spent on a Story

As you know, holding your finger down on an Instagram story freezes it and doesn’t progress to the next story. You can typically ask your viewers if your story contains a lot more text that they can’t read within 15 seconds. The other way is by asking viewers for more time than they usually devote to Instagram stories.

You can use this engagement technique in two ways;

Upload a long piece of text and ask your followers to hold to read. Ensure your story text is valuable and well written so that they don’t feel like they are wasting their time.
Ask them to spot some differences between images or give an opinion. You can edit two photos side by side and ask your Instagram followers to spot any differences.

6. Use @ Mentions

Instagram is all about community, and there is no engagement without a community. This is why you should be an active member of this community and communicate with other brands, influencers, and followers. This shouldn’t be on the comments and DMs only but mention them in the stories as well.

You can send shoutouts to your followers, influencers, and other relevant persons in your Instagram community. You can also share user-generated content on your Instagram stories and ensure that you use the mention sticker. This will not only boost your engagement, widen your reach, but also connect with your audience and industry members.

Conclusion

Using either of the tips mentioned above is a sure way of getting more engagement, comments, likes, and follows in your Instagram account. As you try these tips, integrate the various Instagram analytics to watch how your tactics impact your engagement.