Why You Need to Juice Up Your Instagram Story Highlights

Since its launch 11 years ago, Instagram has constantly rolled out features to help users make the best out of their pages. One of such additions is the Instagram story highlights, which can even pass for a mini-website.

Juicing up your Instagram story highlights is one of the hottest Instagram tips you would get in 2021. So if you have not been making the best out of your highlights or have not updated, then here are a few reasons to chew on.
 

Instagram Story Highlights explained

When people get to your IG page, your Instagram Story Highlights are one of the first things they see. Highlights come right after your bio information.

They're an integral part of your profile, acting as a relevant indicator of what your brand entails. While Instagram Stories disappear after a day, these Highlights remain pinned to your profile for as long as you permit.
 

The directory of Instagram Story Highlights

In the real sense, Story Highlights are Stories that you can make into folder sections on your profile. So you can save any of your stories as highlights.

You can also opt for the archive option which saves your stories automatically, so you can create highlights from those archived stories.
 

The value your Story Highlights bring to your brand

These highlights can add a lot of class and value to your brand, all thanks to a proper and strategic organization.

For starters, you can use highlights to share reviews, testimonials, how-to's, marketing content, brand messages, etc. Imagine sharing how people can patronize or partner with your business.

What's more, it fosters brand trust and strengthens how followers engage with all your other content.

 

The right way to use Instagram Story Highlights

These upsides of using Instagram Story Highlights come at the cost of ensuring proper order. You need to figure out the best style of story to expose your followers to.

You should be very conscious of the social or business journey you want to take your followers through. It's equally essential that you put out the right information to bring followers a step closer to becoming customers/clients.

You don’t want your followers to end up as just prospects without conversions, so you need to drive the perfect story that ends a solid call-to-action. A perfect collection of highlights—in perfect order—tends to result in the perfect journey with followers.

Since the right style leans on the right order, try something like this:
 

• About Us/My story 

• Services/Products 

• Testimonials 

• How to buy 

• Press kit
   

These are just ideas, of course; a template you can follow. Each brand is different and cannot use those exact topics, or at least titles. What you should focus on is the order.

It starts with an introduction of your business, what you offer, social proof that it delivers according to expectations, how new viewers can turn into customers/clients, and then ends with pre-packaged promotional materials.

It's also important to create specific covers for your highlights. If there's a color scheme associated with your brand, you can pick one simple color from it.
 

The viral elements of your Story Highlights

One thing most brands fail to realize is the one distinct difference between offline and online branding. As far as Instagram is concerned, little elements (like the color combination and how it complements the overall look of the brand) have a major effect on patronage. This isn't as important in offline businesses.

In short, you need to make your highlights solid enough to reinforce your brand and attract not just more but better customers/clients. And constantly dish out new stories to ensure that your Instagram Highlights stay updated.
 

How to create Instagram Story Highlights

To reiterate, you can create highlights from an active story. You view the active story and then click on the option at the bottom for highlights.

There is a + symbol there; tap it to create a new highlight. Just input a title for the new highlights and add it. If you follow those steps correctly, your new highlight will appear on your profile.
 

Reinforcing your existing Instagram Story Highlights

It's also possible to add more stories to a published highlight. What you have to do is enter your profile, press and hold the highlight that you want to edit, and tap Edit Highlight. Choose the stories you want to add, and hit Done.

With this method, you can edit the text and cover image of your new highlight. And if you want to delete a highlight, press down on the highlight and click Delete Highlight.

Instagram Story is easily one of the best marketing channels for influencers, creators, celebrities, marketers, and brands. It helps in attracting and engaging followers and real consumers. So don't chill on this; understanding Story Highlights can be your marketing advantage this year.
 

Why you should use Instagram Story Highlights in 2021

• They're a chic way of telling an ongoing story

• They make the content of your stories available to new followers

• They showcase your products and services with great social structure and in a categorized way
   

Take your Highlights to the next level with customized cover icons

An essential element of the social platform is visuals, as people are drawn by what they see. So it's quite relevant to design your Instagram Story Highlights' cover icons. We have several tools to design cover icons online. One great recommendation is Canva.
 

How to use Canva

Canva is a straightforward tool, and it's embedded with exciting icons that you can re-use to make yours. Here are the steps we suggest you follow:

Step 1: Open Canva and Create a Design

Step 2: Choose the format for your Instagram Story

Step 3: Select any of the templates available. Delete the content and edit the background-color. 

Step 4: Go to Elements and search for "field type icon." Choose the icon that best suits the purpose of the story. Set in the middle hand pick a color. You can save it to your device and use it from there.