How to Create Winning Instagram Stories

Instagram Stories are one of the most creative types of video out there. They can be quick and spontaneous or planned out to the smallest detail.

Specs for video:

landscape 16:9 ratio or 1080×1920 pixels

Your video can be 3 to 60 seconds long

Three important things about this type of video:

1. Stay live for 24 hours. Or you can share as a post. Or add as a new “Highlight.”
2. You can download them to save.
3. Being creative goes a very long way.

There are many different kinds of Instagram Stories that you can create. If you want to create a Story that is made up of multiple videos, you can create an outline or storyboard for your videos.

Here’s an example of an Instagram Story Storyboard I made in Canva. Make sure to add spaces for your hashtags, geo-tags, and links that you can add to the Story in the Instagram app.

I love to use wave.video to create my Instagram Story videos. One of the most helpful Wave features is the ability to duplicate videos which helps create a cohesive Instagram Story without recreating the wheel each time. Create an Instagram Story video and then copy to create a coherent series by changing the video, photos, and text.

Make sure to add calls to action in your Instagram Story such as “swipe up to read the article” or “Link in bio for details.” It’s important to remind people that they can get more information and to add the most value to your Instagram Stories.

Once you’ve created your video or videos, you’ll need to upload them to your phone or tablet to post to Instagram. If I create a multiple Stories to go together, I like to use Planoly to upload my Stories on desktop and they sync to my iPhone. Super handy.

To share a photo or video to your story from your mobile device on the Instagram app:

1. Tap in the top left of your screen.
2. Choose to take a photo or upload a photo from your library.
3. Once you've taken a photo or selected a photo from your library, you can tap in the top right to add text.
4. You can tap x in the top left corner to discard your photo or tap to save it to your phone. When you're done, tap Add to your story to share to your story.

Before you share a photo or video to your story, you can tap Save at the bottom of the screen to save it to your phone. You can also save a photo or video you've already shared:

1. Open your story
2. Tap in the bottom right of the photo or video you'd like to save
3. Tap Save
4. Select Save Photo/Video to save the individual photo or video, or select Save Story to save everything from your story as a single video

I can’t wait to see your Instagram Stories!