There’s only so much space in the Instagram feed. That harsh reality has inspired brands to try a variety of creative growth hacks and trends to reach larger audiences on the social media platform.
Commenting on celebrity photos and joining Instagram “pods” are two common ways accounts have jockeyed for attention in a crowded market. Meanwhile, some of the most popular meme pages are experimenting with turning their accounts private so that people have to follow them in order to see their posts.
But Buffer’s latest research suggests that posting to Instagram Stories is perhaps a more sustainable solution to reaching larger audiences.
The social media management platform partnered with Delmondo, a social media analytics platform, to analyze more than 15,000 Instagram stories from 200 of the world’s top brands in one of the largest Instagram Stories research studies to date.
The study found that the more stories top Instagram accounts post, the higher their median reach and impressions. Accounts that posted a series of 10 stories earned twice as many median impressions as accounts that didn’t post at all, and those with 20 stories earned five times the number of median impressions than the non-story posters.
Take one look at the Instagram feed and it’s obvious why that might be so. Instagram Stories take up additional real estate at the top of the news feed, giving brands another opportunity to get their content seen. The more a brand can maintain its position at the top of the feed -- as well as in it -- the more often it will reach its audience.
But it’s not just about improving reach. The users who consume Instagram stories content (all 400 million of them) are so engaged that brands see a 75 percent completion rate on their stories, meaning that their audience stays to watch all the way to the last story frame.
In fact, according to Instagram’s internal data, one-third of the most-viewed stories come from businesses, and one in five stories earns a direct message from its viewers.
Engagement rates on Instagram Stories are so high that brands are finding early success advertising on the feature. Oreo’s eye-catching ads on Instagram Stories helped the cookie brand drive significant growth in ad recognition and ad recall with a 17 percent lower cost per lead.
L’Oréal Paris Russia saw similar success, with a cost per click 22 times lower compared to their average result using Instagram’s carousel ad format. While the costs fell, L’Oréal ads simultaneously enjoyed a 16-point lift in ad recall.
For businesses looking to follow in Oreo and L’Oréal’s footsteps and dramatically improve Instagram reach, timing is everything.
Buffer and Delmondo found the largest spikes in completion rate fell outside of normal U.S. working hours (4-6am EST, 8-10am EST, 12pm-2pm EST, and 8pm-10pm EST).
While this is a helpful starting point, it’s worth remembering that these spikes are averages. In other words, different brands are likely to have very different optimal posting times. While a sports team may find more success directly before and after big games, a travel brand may earn more reach on weekends when wanderlust is highest.
Timing isn’t the only factor, though. Even the number of stories posted at one time can impact a brand’s Instagram analytics.
Buffer and Delmondo found that one to seven stories was the optimal posting length to maximize the number of people who make it all the way through a series of Instagram story posts. After that seven-story threshold, completion rate dropped below 70 percent.
Then again, the number of stories posted positively correlates with an increase in reach and impressions. So while completion rate did drop to 60 percent for a series of 20 stories, the median impressions was still nearly three times more than the seven-story threshold. In other words, the more a brand posts on Stories, the more it can expect to reach a larger audience but get diminishing returns on completion rate.
Regardless of the number of stories a brand posts, prioritizing the best or most important content first is a good idea. Doing so gives people the highest chance to see what matters and maximizes their chances of clicking through.
Finding out what that ‘best’ content is, though, requires patience and testing. While Louis Vuitton posts highly polished video ads, The Guardian found that for their Instagram Stories, less labor-intensive posts like simple static graphics and quick explainer videos outperformed their professionally-produced videos.
Thankfully, that testing process doesn’t have to be super painful. Those looking for deeper analytics than Instagram offers naturally can try Delmondo to get a more detailed view of who is watching their content and when. That way, jumping on the latest growth hacking trend can be more of a scientific experiment and less of a guessing game.