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What are Instagram guides? How to create them and ways to leverage them

. 4 min read . Written by Vanshika Goenka
What are Instagram guides?
How to create them and ways to leverage them
It is thought and feeling which guides the universe, not deeds.

Edgar Cayce

Looking to share and consume useful recommendations and tips in a simple format? Instagram Guides is your knight in shining armour, being the right choice for sharing content that is both curated and scrollable.

What are Instagram Guides?

Instagram Guides was initially conceived as a feature to aid health and wellness professionals during the difficult times of the COVID-19 pandemic. The objective was to provide resources for the unfortunate victims of the dreaded virus.

But today, thanks to its potential, Instagram Guides has become a feature that’s acceptable to all users, especially when it comes to storytelling and e-commerce. Guides are a simple way to share and consume content on Instagram. Thanks to Guides, users can follow a curated flow of posts with the help of commentary. This works especially well for step-by-step guides, tips, and recommendations.

How to create an Instagram Guide

To begin, tap the plus icon on the top-right of your profile page and select “Guide”

From here, choose from the 3 different Guide formats, each designed to meet the different needs of creators.

  1. Places: Recommend places in your city and beyond. These location-based recommendations could range from city guides to pubs, cafes, museums, art galleries, restaurants, etc.
  2. Products: Recommend your favourite products on Instagram. This is a cool tool for the brands or businesses that wish to add something more in terms of context or commentary into their shoppable products. It paves the way for more avenues for tying up with influencers and brand ambassadors who can utilise this tool further to curate recommended products.
  3. Posts: By using this option, you can curate saved or previous posts that you want to recommend. You can create new content by gathering older posts on the same topic.  

Where do I find Instagram Guides?

Go to a creator’s profile page and then select the new Guides icon from the feed tab. Voila! Now, you can access all of the Guides a creator has shared. You can share Guides to your Instagram Stories or with other users by tapping the paper plane icon that’s located at the top right-hand corner of the screen.

Using Instagram Guides for marketing

If you are a brand or a marketer, you can create great long-form content for Instagram using Guides. Doing this helps your marketing in the following ways:

  • Keeps users on your page
    A long-form, scrollable guide ensures that users stay on your content longer. This way they learn more about your brand and products. There’s no need to be redirected to another site for more information, as is the case with regular Instagram posts.
  • Benefit from keyword searches
    Users can use Guide to search for content by keyword. That makes content discovery so much easier on Instagram as you don’t have to search by brand name or hashtag.
  • Extend your reach
    Guides ensure reach expansion as your content created for a specific audience extends even outside your follower base. This is because you are perceived as an expert in your subject matter.
  • Build brand loyalty
    Using Instagram Guides helps you build brand loyalty through your content. Once people find the content useful, it can only increase audience trust. This type of content includes tips, tricks, step-by-step instructions, and other content that your audience might find useful.
  • Increase conversions
    What product guides do so wonderfully well is offer the convenience to shoppers to buy directly from Instagram as they can see products, product descriptions and prices all under one roof.
  • Create shareable content
    Guides can be shared in stories and through DMs. Your audience will share the content further if they like what they see.
  • Forge partnerships with influencers
    Guides help you forge strategic influencer partnerships to highlight your products or services.

With an expansion of Instagram Guides in recent times, there are increased content possibilities in terms of brand promotion. Now, it is possible for eateries to include recipes in their guides, fashion brands can include the latest trends, and cosmetics brands may have step-by-step guides for beauty regimen.

The possibilities, as they say, are endless.

FAQs

  1. What should I know about Instagram guides?
    Instagram Guides are a new feature on Instagram that allows users to easily find and share tips, recommendations, and other content from individual creators, brands or small businesses.
  2. How do you use Instagram guides?
    Go to your profile and click the plus symbol in the upper right corner.
    - Select "Guide" there.
    - Now tap on "Posts".
    - Choose a post from your feed or any saved post that's published by other public accounts.
    - Tap Next.
    - Add your guide title and description.
    - Double check the prepopulated place name, and edit as required.
  3. Are Instagram guides useful?
    Did you know that you can Instagram Guides to highlight your products? It's an amazing way to curate and organize content for your followers. You can organize your products on the basis of bestsellers, new releases, categories, or demographics. Also, it’s really convenient for the followers to buy products as they just have to click the products. This creates a sales process that’s convenient, smooth, and quick.
  4. Can Instagram guides be promoted?
    If you are creating your Instagram Guide for the first time, you can use a variety of photos, carousels, and videos with long descriptions. You can even use your existing posts to promote products from Instagram Shops or even select posts tagged in specific locations.
  5. Where do guides show up on Instagram?
    Guides are located in a separate new tab on a user's profile; It is the booklet icon that appears between the photo grid icon and tagged photos icon. These guides also appear in the Explore tab.
  6. What does it mean if someone adds your photo to a guide on Instagram?
    Guides are a simple way to share and consume content on Instagram. They allow users to follow a curated flow of posts with commentary. This is especially good for step-by-step guides, tips, and recommendations.
  7. Do Instagram guides increase engagement?
    Yes. Each item in the guide is linked to an Instagram post, where it can drive organic engagement. Each guide item also links to a product in the brand's Instagram shop, where it can generate sales.