12 Tips to Insta Stories

It’s recently become apparent to me that many of my friends don’t know how to use Insta Stories and I can’t say I blame them. As much as I’m on the platform, I even had to ask some questions the day it launched. It’s like they dropped it on us, without any warning or explanation. Well, no fear, if you’re still struggling, I’m here to help with some simple steps that some of my most seasoned pals didn’t know either.

For those who are really out of the loop (I’m looking at you, Mom!), Insta Stories is a part of the Instagram platform that was launched in August. It’s a feature that allows you to pop in a stream of photos and/or video that expire after 24 hours. It’s what you do if you want to connect with your tribe about what you’re doing on a daily basis but the image isn’t likely something you want on your forever feed.  It’s like Snapchat without the fun filters and additional features. But, it gets the job done. The best part is you don’t need a new app for it, no switching back and forth to different platforms. Everything’s in one place. And, if you hadn’t joined Snap, like me, there’s no need to build up your audience again. All of your followers and friends on Instagram can see your Stories.

And Insta just announced today that stories will now be a part of Explore. Explore is the section (magnifying glass on bottom nav bar) that introduces you to new people and businesses you may not have discovered but will likely want to follow based upon other accounts you interact with, something that, to my knowledge, Snap doesn’t do. So there’s never been a better time to get on Stories and make some compelling images and videos! Here’s how:

Getting Started:

1. On your Insta feed, hit the little house icon on the bottom left.

2. At the top left, there’s a plus sign with a circle. Choose that.

3. It will turn into a camera screen with a big white circle in the bottom center. Hit that once for a photo or hold down to video.

“Advanced” Stuff:

4. When you’re done, you can SAVE your photo or video by pushing the down arrow on the bottom right and upload later. Or hit cancel on bottom left to take again.

5. If you want to access your saved photos, videos and regular camera roll, when in Insta Stories camera, take your finger, go to the top of the screen and lightly drag down until you see a bar of recent photos and videos. Select whatever you’d like.

6. You can also use photos and videos you’ve taken with your regular iPhone camera BUT these will be a bit distorted and not to scale so it’s best to take them in Stories and save them for later. Or intentionally zoom out a bit when taking a photo for Stories, knowing it will crop a bunch of it out.

7. If you take a longer video on your camera, you can edit and save it there and then upload the segment you want in Stories.

8. Once you have your image or movie, on the top right hit the “Aa” for text. And the marker for highlighting or freestyle writing.

9. When you’re done, simply tap the screen to go back.

10. You can now make words and letters different colors in the same Story by highlighting them like you would in an email or text. Double click, drag and then choose your color.

11. When watching others’ Stories, you can tap the screen to move on to the next.

12. You can also take your finger and hold down to pause the story instead of having to go back and watch again.

And, there you have it, the complete Idiot’s (a.k.a. me)  Guide to Insta Stories! Hope it helped. Happy storytelling!