A new Facebook study evaluates what interests people in both formats on Instagram and how marketers can give users what they want.
For this study, Facebook interviewed about 10 thousand people from the United States, Britain, Indonesia and Brazil aged 13-55, using Instagram at least once a week. Researchers wanted to know the nuances of using news feeds and stories to help marketers fine tune cross-platform campaigns.
Today, more than half of Instagram users use Stories as often as the main feed. Both formats attract ordinary users and companies to watch, create and share content. Nevertheless, there are serious differences between them.
Instagram Stories
Content on Instagram Stories opens in full screen. Stories disappear after 24 hours if the author of the publication does not save them in the “Highlights”. Here you can use creative tools: stickers, emoji, gifs.
Instagram feed
The content in the feed occupies a smaller part of the screen compared to Stories. Remains in the account forever if it is not deleted. When creating, you can add filters.
Study participants looked for differences between formats. Users from all four countries consider both Stories and feed a suitable place to publish beautiful works and creative experiments.
However, the use of different formats is associated with people on different occasions. So, in Stories, they expect to see live, raw photos and videos (like backstage videos from Fashion Week or boomerangs from athletes before big competitions).
Therefore, to more accurately assess which of the actions affect the result more, it is necessary to use advanced analytics on Instagram, which will show data on the interaction of followers with content.
According to this data, the marketer should use the feed to announce new products, and Stories to engage users with authentic, real content.
We highly recommend you to buy likes on Instagram for your feed. When you do, your posts will rank higher and therefore, the content will be seen by more users, both in their home feed by users that follow you, as by the users that search on hashtags. You can click here to learn more.
Stories or feed?
It turns out that people choose Stories in two cases:
- When they want to know what their friends are doing right now.
- When they want to see “live”, unfiltered content, everyday life.
The feed is suitable for a much larger list of actions: finding information about new products, viewing funny content and more. This is probably because the format of the feed is what users know better.
What content do users prefer in Stories and which one in the stream?
The fact that users prefer to search for new products and brands in the feed rather than in stories does not mean that they do not want to see branded content on Instagram Stories.
Users from Brazil, the USA, and the UK value brand messages in Stories more than in the feed. That is, although people are more accustomed to looking for information about brands and products in the feed, they like to see such materials in Stories.
What does this mean for marketers?
Use Stories
Interviewed users said Stories help them get in touch with others. incorporate Stories into your Instagram campaign to support user engagement.
Live up to expectations
Although the Stories and the feed are very similar in many ways, people associate a different experience with each of the formats. Keep these expectations in mind when creating quality content: share unprocessed, “backstage” footage in Stories and talk about new products in the feed.
Focus on your market
Users from different countries perceive content in the feed and Stories differently. Consider research relevant to your audience or conduct your experiments. Therefore, to assess whether your actions bring results, you will have to use analytics on Instagram, which will show advanced data on account statistics.
Instagram Captions
A caption is a short text below a photo in your account. Instagram allows you to write texts up to 2200 characters. If this amount is not enough, bloggers transfer part of the entry to the first comment.
Hashtags are added to the photo caption on Instagram or tagged by users. You can add emojis to your caption. The main thing is not to overdo it with their number.
What does the caption contain?
First of all, the caption is the functional part of the post. Bloggers here talk about a product that they advertise, and brands convey a key message that cannot be expressed visually. For example, they talk about a new collection or detailed instructions for contests.
More and more bloggers are appearing on Instagram using the platform to publish small texts. Popular topics: proper nutrition, exercise, personal care, recipes, parenting, travel notes.
Serious or controversial topics sometimes arise, as a result of which long discussions begin in the comments. Instagram recently announced tree comments – this update shows that the platform is evolving not only in the direction of visual content.
How to tag a person on a photo caption on Instagram?
The user can be tagged in the post in two ways: on the image or tagged in the caption.
- To tag a person in the photo, click on the three dots in the right corner above the photo, then “Change”. Click on “User’s tags” in the lower-left corner, a window will open where you can tag a user – start entering his username anywhere on the photo. With this option, the user will receive a notification about it, and the photo will appear in his account.
- To tag a person in the caption, add the @ sign and start typing the username – you will see a list of users in the tooltip, select one from them.
The user will receive a notification that he was mentioned in the caption, but this post cannot be found in his profile.
Conclusion
The most important on Instagram is interaction, and the best is to combine true interaction with bought interaction, to make sure your posts are seen and become popular!