Story Highlights are for sure one of my favorite additions to Instagram. At first I was confused on their purpose and couldn’t even figure out how to properly put a cover on them, but as I started to use my stories more, I realized there were many events/products/moments that I wanted to keep beyond 24 hours.
Story Highlights are the little circles that separate your bio from your feed with the purpose of keeping stories available that are past the 24 hour mark. In my opinion Story Highlights are super helpful to showcase what you do visually especially if you’re like myself and don’t do a lot of long form videos on your feed.
If Instagram is your creative resume, Story Highlights are the cliff notes. I truly believe that some of my opportunities have come based on how I covered another event or moment. If you do make up tutorials, BTS footage, anything directly related to your brand, you definitely should use your Story Highlights to house that footage. Let’s get into why you should use story highlights.
Adds Value to Your Brand
Story Highlights and the content you keep behind them can definitely add value to your brand. Like I mentioned above, I believe that my opportunities are based on my brand as a whole, but also based on how I’ve done something else in the past. Once I started using story templates, it became just as important for me to focus on my highlights as well as my feed.
If you want to show a tutorial, link to your products and services, testimonials, or even show behind the scenes, your story highlights add to your credibility. Our audience takes in a lot of information a day, whether it’s a first time visitor or someone returning, making your value easily accessible is helpful to anyone stopping by.
Place for FAQ’s (Frequently Asked Questions)
Story Highlights are a perfect place for questions that your audience constantly asks; I created a Presets highlight just for this. What are the questions that you get asked a lot? What do you find yourself repeating to your audience? From promo codes to where you buy certain products, keeping those answers in a highlight makes it easy for you to direct people that DM you to that exact answer. Chances are if you have it already they may check it out before DMing you.
Place for Ongoing Collaborations
Story Highlights are a perfect up sale. If you’re pitching a brand or sharing the value you can add to a brand collaboration, a branded or custom story highlight is a great option for giving your audience continued coverage and giving a brand continued exposure.
If you are an affiliate or ambassador for a brand you can store all of your posts or videos of you using the product, testing things out, etc. I could do better at this myself and plan to moving forward, but it’s a perfect place for anything that you consistently use and want to keep your audience on top of.
Place for Niched Content
I don’t actually have my niche listed in my bio anymore; the closest space I can house content around my niche is my story highlights. Categories such as Events, #BTS, Food, Beauty, Wifey, Presets, etc., give your audience insight on the type of content they can expect from you or at least what you share here and there.
The perfect thing about using story highlights for your niche is you can still use content even if it doesn’t quite flow with your feed. The events I go to and the colors and things that are present don’t always go with my feed or current filter, so being able to re-purpose that content goes along way. I love checking out people’s story highlights because it usually tells me a lot about them.
If you’re wondering if you need to use your story highlights, I’m going to say yes. If you haven’t quite created enough content to house behind them, this is a good reason to get on stories more.
What are some ways you use your highlights? Share them below.
