By now, most of you have seen that Instagram looks verrryyy similar to Snapchat. Now that you’ve seen it, how do you use it? Here’s our take on Instagram stories v. Snapchat.

Instagram Stories v. Snapchat

Instagram

Instagram recently upped its game to compete with a favorite app among many, Snapchat. Since Instagram’s launch years ago, the app has prided itself on being for “in the moment” happenings (hence the name “instant gram”). The idea was to take a photo, add a filter, if you choose, and post the picture for your followers to have a look at what you’re currently doing.

Snapchat

Snapchat follows the same idea about being an app for “in the moment” happenings, but in a slightly different way. You can post photos to your Snapchat story and give people the opportunity to look at them for 24 hours. After that, they’re gone forever. When you post something on Instagram, it’s there for your followers to see for as long as you decide to keep it up (usually indefinitely).

Instagram’s Perks

Instagram’s new “stories” feature allows you to do the same concept as Snapchat, without messing up the flow of your Instagram feed. On your homepage you can view your friend’s stories over and over for 24-hours, then they get automatically deleted.

The perk of posting stories on Instagram over Snapchat is if your Instagram profile is not set to private, anyone can see that you have a story to share, and they can view it if they happen to stumble upon your feed. When you view someone’s Instagram feed, and their profile photo is highlighted in orange and purple, this means they have a story to watch. This creates a much larger platform for exposure compared to Snapchat, where you can only view your friend’s stories, and you have to manually add people to your friend’s list on the app.

Our Story

After hearing the hype about Snapchat a few months ago, we decided to give it a try using a business aspect and some of the strategies mentioned. We found the hardest thing was trying to connect with people on the app who we wanted to see our content. Unless you know other’s usernames, or link your Snapchat to your contacts, it’s hard to find people around you who might be interested in your stories. There is no “search” button on Snapchat like there is on Instagram.

With Instagram, while people are searching other’s profiles, they have a chance to not only view their feed, they can also watch their stories as well. That makes the reach of your Instagram story almost limitless, compared to a story you post on Snapchat.

Our Snapchat stories would reach less than twenty people on average, and while this wasn’t bad for the short amount of time we were using the app, the first story we published on Instagram received over 200 views. That means our Instagram stories are reaching over ten times the amount of people as compared to our Snapchat stories. For us, the answer to the question “which one is a better fit for South Street & Co?” was obvious.

Ideas for Instagram Stories v. Snapchat

Tricks of the trade or tips from a professional

These some of our favorite things to share on our stories. Things we do in the office every day that seem like second nature to us, but might not be so easily understood by others is a great way to put an educational twist on it.

Behind the scenes stories

These also good because people are always interested in what other people do with their lives throughout the day (which is why they’re on the app) and even if it’s just running around town between meetings, or grabbing coffee during your lunch break, make it interesting and post it for your followers to see what you do every day.

Our favorites

These are videos we make highlighting our favorite apps for scheduling posts, or for creating visual content. These don’t have to be super specific to marketing, we’ve seen makeup artists with videos on their favorite everyday makeup products and where you can buy them.
“Q&A” or interview videos

These are a fun way to get your followers involved by giving them the opportunity to ask questions where you can create short videos and give them insights into your life/business. We recently made a Q&A story from the question “how do you make a flat lay?” (which we’ve been obsessing over lately.)  Here are some screenshots from that story.

As we mentioned above, we tried both Snapchat and Instagram and we found our reach was significantly more on Instagram stories. We were also working hard (and have been) on growing our Instagram following. So it only makes sense for us to concentrate on that platform.

Which one do you use for your business? Which do you prefer, Instagram Stories v. Snapchat? Tweet at us @SouthStreet_Co and let us know!

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