Getting to know your audience and their opinions is getting easier than ever on Instagram.
Perhaps you are familiar already with the option of adding yes/no polls and multiple-choice questions to Insta-Story and the option of an ‘emoji slider’ (to express your emotion on a scale). Last week Instagram rolled out “Questions”. A tool that posts Questions stickers to the story, that says: ‘ask me a question’. Everyone can respond to the sticker and you can share the question and response with your followers. No need to answer every question cause you can filter it out before you send it back into the world.
What does that mean?
The stories are now dominated by questions and especially celebrities are using the tool to answer the most common questions. For some celebrities that you might follow, could it be worthy to have your question finally answered. Also, it is another form of engagement because it feels like your Insta-crush replies directly to you.
Before learning the hard way, keep in mind that questions aren’t asked anonymous and everyone can share the profile of the sender.
Especially when it comes to personal profiles, people tend to think it is a bit self-indulging, answering questions about yourself, takes out the ‘conversation’ and makes it less creative.
Businesswise could it be a very useful tool, let’s say you follow a photographer on Instagram and you can now ask him any question you like regarding his Insta-layer, type of camera or other tips. You can do this through DM but he’ll probably notice your question sooner when you send it through this tool instead of ending somewhere in the inbox of your favourite Instagrammer.
Negative comments are that Instagram should be used for photo and video and not for this question tool. Especially when you follow someone because of the content they create on social. But turn it around, you can ask your followers everything as well. From suggestions regarding your business to where to go on your next holiday. Followers can experience the joy of contributing to your business or life and you can actually receive some very valuable information.
Most important is to not over do it, answering an overload of questions or asking too many questions. It’s not something we would like to see in real life either. Few things that could be useful to prevent an overload of answers on your story:
– Answer as many questions as possible in one slide
– Short answers
– Ask questions in return
– Instagram doesn’t allow you to answer questions through DM, but you can always do that separately