You can now add links to standalone sites directly to Instagram Stories content, even if you don’t have more than 10,000 followers or your account is not verified.
As Instagram officially explains.
When we first introduced Stories links, the feature was limited to verified accounts or accounts that had a certain number of followers. But now you can share links in Stories regardless of the size of your account.
How do I add a link to Stories?
- Upload content to Stories
- Select the Sticker tool from the top navigation bar
- Place the sticker on the Stories content and click on the sticker color to change it
Stories links are an effective way to drive users from product ads to standalone sites, and with the help of interesting video content, users are more likely to click on the links for further exploration.
Links can be used in a variety of ways. If you want to find potential users, you can direct a link from Stories to the site’s registration page and have them leave an email address; if you want to increase sales, you can have the link point to the product detail page for quick customer orders; if you want to increase user engagement, you can also set the link directly to the corresponding site board. Stories provides a way to add a link, and it’s up to you to decide where that link points.
And, the effect of the link is statistically measurable. Even if you cooperate with multiple weblebrities for promotion and point all their Stories to the same website link, you can judge which promotion is more effective based on the click data of different weblebrities’ Stories.
In fact, in late August, Instagram updated and optimized this feature. The “link sticker” replaced the previous “swipe up” option to view links.
The stickers look similar to other types of stickers and can be switched to different styles, sizes and positions. This update makes the links more prominent and will increase viewers’ desire to click.
As Instagram focuses more and more on video content, the platform will also optimize and promote the Stories and Reels features more, as Facebook CEO Zuckerberg noted in his recent earnings report.
Reels is already a major driver of Instagram engagement growth, and I think there is tremendous potential for the future. I’m optimistic that it’s as important as Stories. We also expect to make significant changes to Instagram and Facebook over the next year to further tilt the video space and make Reels a core part of the experience.
Obviously, Reels is a core element, but Stories is also being incorporated into the broader video push, and ultimately, Instagram will be retooled around both. What can be expected is that Stories will have increased exposure value and content priority, and sellers can feel confident in building their traffic on this piece.
Instagram also said that they are working on a way to customize link stickers so that people understand where the link is pointing when they click on it, and we think this piece of optimization will be link preview or something similar.
Finally, Instagram mentions that “new accounts and accounts that repeatedly share offending content will not be able to access link tags. It’s easy to understand what an offending account is, but what exactly is a new account? However, according to our assumptions, new accounts may be judged with reference to these two points.
- New accounts registered within a short period of time (e.g. 1 month as a limit).
- Accounts registered in the past, even if this account has been registered for a long time, but has not browsed the content, has not interacted, and in general has relatively little action behavior on the account, such accounts will also be judged as new accounts.
If you have not yet started operating your own Instagram account, it is recommended that you register now. On the one hand, you can learn about the content posted by sellers or KOLs of similar products, and on the other hand, you can also browse through actions such as operations to get through the newbie period. Since Zuckerberg has said that Reels and Stories are the future direction, shouldn’t you as a seller keep up with this wave of traffic benefits?
