I have decided to start this blog on a personal note once again, relating it to the experiences i’ve had working with brands and even noticing effective strategies with my own Instagram business page. Over the last 3-5 years there has been a large increase in traffic to one of Instagram and Facebooks newest forms of communication through social media that is called a Story.

A story, in social media terms can be explained as an in-app feature that allows users to share ephemeral content available for 24 hours. Your Instagram Story is published separately from your in-feed content and while the story is a lot shorter than a post or reel it is a quick way that brands and people are using to share an important experience or in the brands sake a brief look at a product or event, which can sometimes even prompt you to swipe up and visit an Instagram profile or website for more information.

Let’s Clark 2021

A Reel, in social media terms can be explained as a new concept where you can share and discover engaging short videos on Instagram that you would fit all the most entertaining and important information in one 60 second video. The new feature lets you edit 60 second multi-clip videos with various effects and audio to make the result as entertaining as possible. The only limitation is your own imagination.

Instagram Launches Reels – TuneCore

August 7th, 2020

What I have found over the years is that a lot of brands have opted to exercise the idea that not all users of social media platforms, want to sit and read a long caption about a product or an experience and instead would rather watch a video with artistic points of view, relatable music and short text, now that doesn’t mean just any video will work. Organizations have also found that users also don’t prefer to sit and watch a 5 minute video with the same person talking with a voiceover, or the same song on a loop for 5 minutes. What they have found is the best way to get a message across is to choose 1 or 2 main aspects of that product and/or experience, event etc and highlight that in one short 15 second video that keeps the viewer entertained with music, transitions, bright text and encouraging videography where they will then want to get involved and can then be taken to another external link through the caption or story with more information on that topic should they grab an interest for it.

I personally have noticed this work first hand, being a photographer, some brands will even take the images and turn it into a slideshow so that they can add music and I have noticed a huge difference in the engagement rate with reels and stories versus a traditional post on the feed with a long informative caption. Another reason these reels get noticed with a larger audience is a lot of the music used is currently trending, meaning other users on Instagram are using that same sound track for their own reels and anyone using that soundtrack will show up on the explore page of that particular sound track meaning it will be seen to a wider audience than if it were just posted to a feed with only your own followers.

If i’m being honest as a photographer it has been quite difficult to adapt to this transition because sharing stills is the nature of my job and what I always used Instagram for over the years, however I have began to self teach myself videography in hopes to share a video version of each photograph that I take and express what that photograph looked like in real time.

Here is an example of how I would promote this blog through Facebook and Instagram to those looking to learn about the effectiveness of Stories and Reels in Social Media:

Facebook: What are Reels and Stories and how can they effectively be used to promote brand content? Find out here: http://bit.ly/3MZZQYi

Instagram: What are #Reels and #Stories and how do they effectively increase a brands success through Social Media? Find out here: http://bit.ly/3MZZQYi

https://www.epidemicsound.com/blog/what-is-instagram-reels-and-how-do-you-use-it/?psafe_param=1&us=adwords_max&_usx=14492154145&utm_source=google&utm_medium=paidsearch&utm_campaign=max_14492154145&utm_term=&gclid=Cj0KCQjwmtGjBhDhARIsAEqfDEcvgLldZE8koQx5pOwgcwgC7L_K0QH09n3srrONkA_sTPi5puWz3eMaAomHEALw_wcB

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/instagram-stories

Sophia Bernazzani

Published: July 12, 2021