How to create custom Instagram Stories highlights

How to create custom Instagram Stories highlights

by Katarina Nápoles

Published December 18, 2019

Some information deserves to last longer than a 24h story. With this in mind, Instagram created the Highlights in early 2018: a feature that allows users to leave multiple stories pinned to their profile indefinitely.

As they are well below the biography of each profile, the highlights are perfect for us to put the most important information about our business or simply to draw the attention of those who are visiting the profile for the first time.

In this article we will teach you how to create your own highlights, how to make them well made and personalized, and we’ve listed eight ways to get you started now! Come read!

Why Instagram Highlights Matter

Like the bio information, Instagram highlights are in a privileged place in the profile. Because of this, the feature is super important in driving followers or new visitors to the best of your content, which can encourage them to tighten follow.

Highlights should act as curated showcases of what you’ve already produced, as well as being a great resource for pinning down important information about your business. In addition, it’s still a way to express your company’s branding and keep your Instagram profile cohesive.

How to Make Instagram Highlights

Any story you post can become a highlight on your profile, but ideally you should create custom covers to keep things well organized. In addition to strengthening the branding of your brand, custom covers draw much more attention, go for me!

Creating a Custom Highlight

Today, many programs and applications available on the web allow us to create images and illustrations, like InstaSize, HypeType, PicsArt and others you can read more about in this other article. In this one, we chose to teach you how to make covers from Canva which, in our opinion, is today the simplest application to use for those with no design experience.

I exemplified with Canva Web, but you can also download the mobile app version, which is available for iOS and Android.

Follow this step by step:

1. Within Canva, click Create a Design, then choose Instagram Story.

2. Click Background and then + Solid Color to choose the color that best matches your brand’s branding and Instagram profile. Here at Postgrain, we chose the color yellow:

3. Select the Elements tab, which is in the left menu. Here you will search for the picture you want to cover. For this example, I chose the megaphone.

4. Click on the element you want and center the icon on the image. You can also choose a color for the icon by simply clicking on it and then selecting a color from the top menu.

Tip: you can also download icons available from websites like Flaticon or Adobe Spark and use any vector you have created yourself. To insert in the image, just click on Uploads and upload the icon.

5. If you want to make more than one cover at a time, just click Add New Page. When you have completed the entire project, click Download at the top right of the page. Here you will choose the file format. We suggest always using PNG or JPEG.

How to upload Instagram Highlights

First and foremost, you need to make sure you are saving your stories to your Instagram file so they can stay active for more than 24 hours. Since the “file” function was released, Instagram has made it the default activation for everyone. But if you ever disabled the feature, you will need to enable it again.

To do so, go to your Settings and click Privacy. Select the Story tab, scroll down and enable the Save to Archive option.

 

Note: If you turned on the stories file only now, only the ones posted at that time will be in the file, right? Unable to retrieve stories from when you did not have the file function enabled yet. To access your archive, simply click on the clock symbol that appears on the profile and choose Archive.

From here, the whole process of highlighting stories and saving your covers can only be done by mobile. So if you created the covers by computer (as we did here), pass the images to the phone. Nowadays it is no longer necessary to post the cover in the Stories to highlight it. But if you prefer, just follow this walkthrough:

  1. Post the cover image to your Stories, as you usually would;
  2. Click on the Highlight icon in the lower right corner;
  3. Choose to create a new one;
  4. Name the Highlight, and then click Add.

Another way to create a highlight is by doing it directly from your profile. This way, you don’t need to post your cover, but you need to have posted at least one story that will be featured:

  1. On your profile, click the Highlight icon;
  2. Choose at least one Story to highlight and click Next;
  3. Give your highlight a title and click Edit Cover to upload the image you created. Then just click Finish.

If you already have a highlight created and just want to change its cover, you can also do that without posting anything to your Instagram Stories:

  1. Click and hold on Highlight;
  2. Click Edit Highlight and then Edit Cover;
  3. Click on the image icon that appears next and choose the cover from your gallery.

 

8 Ways to Use Instagram Stories Highlights

If everything is highlighted, nothing is highlighted. Now that you know how to customize your covers and how to organize Instagram highlights, it’s time to start thinking about what exactly you’ll be highlighting on your profile.

From small local businesses to platforms that sell solutions online, you can always use the highlights to our advantage and according to what the brand needs. Here is a list of eight ways to use the highlights. Evaluate which one (s) can best match your profile and get to work!

Highlight Your Business Key Information

If you have an Instagram business and spend all day answering questions such as what time your business is open, or where your address is, do you accept a card, etc. Highlights can help you – a lot!

Of course, a good way to narrow down this work is the quick answers feature, but you can also pin all the answers to these questions directly to your profile.

As an example, we have the restaurant Udon, which leaves frequently asked questions for users. They put the address of each unit, information about job vacancies in restaurant, explanations of delivery and even highlight this item to answer the most frequently asked questions of customers about the sushi carvery. Cool huh?

Categorize the best content on your profile

When working on content production on Instagram, Stories Highlights are perfect for categorizing everything that is produced into topics and presenting in a much easier way for followers and new users to access.

But don’t forget what we talk about hype: it’s not cool to highlight absolutely ALL content that was produced with a specific theme. Curate the best stories.

Also be careful when creating these categories: choose only the best subjects to highlight. Here at Postgrain we categorize the highlights that our followers love to see on the profile: quick tips, Q&A and behind the scenes work at the office, for example.

Highlight products and services

Whether you have a restaurant, a bar, a store, a clothing brand or even software that is sold over the Internet, highlighting every product you sell is a great way to create an easier-to-see catalog and still catch the eye of people. people for your business.

If your product catalog is giant, prioritize the items you sell the most and detail each one in the highlights. The Baker Rooster profile, for example, has a highlight for each product category that is best sold, such as breads, croissants and salads. Within each highlight, they detail product variations.

To promote your products properly create more video stories as you can include more details. You can easily make these videos with a tool like InVideo. It has video templates for Instagram stories. When you create these highlights, you should also link to the product page directly if you have more than 10,000 followers.

Highlight new collections or product sets

For those who have a clothing store is difficult to highlight all products, right? A good solution in this regard is to highlight your collections. That way you can showcase your products while creating consistency without leaving anything messy.

The Oush store uses the highlights whenever it launches a collection with a new print. Very easy to find:

Highlight tutorials

Many Instagram profiles create tutorial content. And highlighting them is the best way to organize your profile and make it even more flashy! Best of all, this kind of Spotlight brings people to interactive, super-easy-to-consume content.

The store profile Contém Glitter, for example, has created simple and quick tutorials on how to use glitter in everyday makeup. Is there a better way to sell your product than showing exactly how it can be used?

Highlight audience ratings

If your customers are passionate about what you do or sell, you can definitely use it to your advantage with the highlights! So whenever someone new arrives, or even that person who is in doubt, the highlights with the positive ratings can give extra strength.

To go further, try placing links in stories that lead users to each product described in each review. That way you leave everything in his hand, just click to get access and buy what you sell.

Highlight launches, promotions and sweepstakes

Regardless of which stories you highlight on your profile, this tip can always accompany you. Many times someone can find you @ because of a promotion or giveaway that you’ve advertised, so make it easily accessible right away.

So everyone who falls into your profile because of this can consume other page content more easily.

Highlight Partnerships

If you often partner, are always in touch with influencers, and have a habit of associating your products with a familiar face, the highlights can also help you with that.

Whether it’s a brand collaboration or a proposal created for a specific influencer, stand out! All users coming from these brands or through this influencer will be able to know you better.

Colcci does it very well and with an extremely professional touch to the stories. Notice how the brand uses photos as covers, but all are in black and white and are super well produced.

Highlights Tips & Tricks

We have some idea of ​​some questions that may have popped into your head so far. So, so that no one leaves this article without answers, there you go:

How many stories can I highlight?

Instagram allows you to add up to 100 stories to each highlight. If your highlight already has 100 stories and you add one more, the first highlight story will be removed and returned to the file.

Can I highlight very old stories?

As I said in this article, you can only highlight stories posted since you started archiving them. If you have never disabled this option, then you can use stories from December 2017, when Instagram launched the feature.

How to organize the position of each highlight?

Whenever you create a new highlight, it gets priority on the profile, in front of everyone. This also happens when you add a new story to a highlight. Automatically this highlight is “updated” and then takes the first position of the profile.

So whenever you want to bring a highlight forward, just update it with some story. If you have nothing to post again and want to prioritize it anyway, highlight a story and delete it right away. It works!

Conclusion

If you have an Instagram feature that is flexible, this is Instagram Stories Highlights. There are several ways you can use them on your profile, and good use only has benefits: a more cohesive branding, an opportunity to gain new followers, and a place where users can always come in to get to know you better.