Category: Marketing Automation

Instagram is a powerful channel for businesses to reach a larger audience — in fact, approximately 80% of the platform’s one billion users follow at least one business on Instagram.
If your brand is on Instagram, you need to be communicating and engaging with your audience, and Instagram Questions can help you do just that.

Introduced in 2018, Questions Sticker found within Instagram stories is a feature that makes it easier than ever to engage with, and receive feedback from, your followers. Here, we’re going to explore 15 creative ways to use Instagram’s Questions Sticker to engage with your followers. But first, let’s review how to use it.
Table of Contents:

How to Use Instagram’s Questions Sticker
Instagram Story Questions Ideas

How to Use Instagram’s Questions Sticker
1. Go to your Stories feature, and either upload a photo or take one (I took one within the Stories feature of my pizza box). Then, click the square smiley face in the top right of your screen.

2. Click the “Questions” module.

3. The default for the Questions Sticker is “Ask me a question” but you can click the text to type a customized question — for instance, I typed “I love this pizza place! What’s everyone’s favorite pizza toppings?” Once you’re done, add filters or any other features you’d like to include.
When you’re ready to post, click “Send To” in the bottom right.

4. Finally, click “Share” beside “Your Story” to post your question to your Story.

5. When you’re ready to see your followers’ answers to your question, open your Story and click the images of the profiles in the bottom left (these are the people who’ve seen your Story).

6. You’ll see “Responses” above the list of people who’ve seen your post. To individually share one to your Story, click on it.

7. Click “Share Response” to share an individual response to your Story for your other followers to see.

8. Next, take a photo or upload one, and the follower’s response you chose will appear on top of the image. When you’re ready to post, click “Send To” in the bottom right.

It’s important to note — your followers will become tired of constantly answering questions on your Story, so use the Questions feature sparingly. You don’t want to overuse the Questions Sticker and risk answer-fatigue from participants.
Additionally, you have a “Poll” feature if you want to ask your followers a binary question, like “Which pizza topping is better, cheese or pepperoni?” Save your Questions feature for more complex questions — and try to make them fun. Remember, your followers are on Instagram for entertainment, so they don’t want to feel quizzed by tough questions.
Lastly, consider what types of questions might actually help you know more about your audience. This will take some trial-and-error, since every brand’s audience is unique, so test a few different formats. For instance, if your brand is in the tech industry, perhaps you want to post a Question asking your followers’ their feedback on an innovative new tech product.
Alternatively, if your brand is in the retail industry, maybe you want to ask more generic questions like, “Do you still follow the no-white after Labor Day rule? If so, tell me why.”
For more inspiration, let’s explore some creative ways influencers, celebrities, and brands use the Questions Sticker.

Instagram Story Questions Ideas
1. Conduct a Q&A with your followers.
Influencers and celebrities often use Instagram Story Questions to conduct Q&As with their fans. For instance, Ali Fedotowsky, a blogger and former Bachelorette, will typically tell her followers to “Ask me stuff :)” at the end of the day.
Her responses are usually fun, casual, and friendly — like “Today? The wine” in response to “Best part of being a mom?”. These Q&A’s enable Ali’s followers to feel like they’re having a casual conversation with a friend. Additionally, the Q&A’s help Ali create stronger relationships with her fans and gear content towards what they want to know.

2. Showcase your brand’s values.
Away, a luggage company with 577K followers on Instagram, used the Questions Sticker to show support for Pride week while engaging meaningfully with followers. In the first post, they wrote “Happy #Pride from all of us at Away”, and followed the post with a question — “How are you celebrating?” to further engage with followers.

3. Conduct a pop quiz.
Companies can use the Questions Sticker to test the audience’s knowledge or ask fun questions related to the brand. Pattern, a company that sells products specifically for curly hair, is expanding its product distribution and asked its audience to guess what the first international retailer will be. 

This approach gets the audience involved in the distribution conversation and helps potential customers in that geographic location get excited about picking up the product at a retailer near them. 
4. Ask followers their thoughts on a new product or service launch.
If done wisely, you might consider using the Questions Sticker to ask your followers what they think about a new product or service — but conduct these Questions sparingly, since they might seem too self-promotional.
Beardbrand, a line of high-quality grooming products for men, effectively used the Questions Sticker to ask their niche audience how they felt about Beardbrand’s new shampoo and conditioner products. Beardbrand also posted their followers’ answers, and used it as an opportunity to demonstrate the brand’s sense of humor — for instance, in response to a follower’s “Crafted by the gods” answer, Beardbrand posted “If you say so” with a side-eye emoji.
If you do decide to ask followers about their thoughts on your product or service, consider posting their answers with funny or unique responses as well.

5. Share information from a thought leader or expert.
Your Questions feature doesn’t just have to feature your own brand — you might also use it to post useful content from other experts in the field, as long as you believe your followers would still be interested in it.
For instance, Eva Chen, an author and influencer with 2 million followers on Instagram, knows a good portion of her followers are mothers as well — which is why she featured her sleep trainer, @thebabycoachofficial, on her Story to answer some of her followers’ biggest sleep-related questions. This partnership helps @thebabycoachofficial reach a new audience and grow her following, while providing Eva Chen’s followers with free, useful tips — a win, win.

6. Use Questions as a lead generation strategy.
Megan Gilmore is a best-selling author and creator of the Instagram account @Detoxinista, which posts healthy recipes as well as Instant Pot tips-and-tricks. When Gilmore conducts “Ask me anything” Q&A’s, her followers typically ask recipe-related questions, which allows Gilmore to organically link to recipes on her blog — for instance, in response to “A good vegetable soup recipe”, Gilmore links to her vegetable soup recipe.
However, it’s important to note Gilmore doesn’t just link externally in her Q&A’s — she also provides useful tips and content from within the Story itself. When followers ask her about an Instant Pot, for instance, she posted the answer right within the Story for other followers to see.
Simply put, you can use Questions as an opportunity to link to your website, blog posts, or other helpful content, but do so sparingly, and ensure some of your responses to your followers’ questions can be found within the Story itself. This can help drive traffic to other content, but doesn’t require your followers to be ready to click-away from your Instagram page if they don’t want to.

7. Share tips from within the industry.
On Instagram, HubSpot’s followers are often other marketers — which is why it’s helpful for @HubSpot to post “What are some of your favorite marketing tips?” and share the responses of some of its followers, so other marketers within the industry can collect tips from a myriad of sources.
Ultimately, you might use Questions as an opportunity to connect with your followers and learn from them, as well. Rather than asking questions directly related to your product or service, consider how you might ask a question that helps your followers learn more about the state of the industry, including tips, trends, and new ideas to improve their own business strategy. Show them their voice is valuable, too.

8. Have fun with your followers!
Reese Witherspoon is an exceptional example of someone who uses Stories and the Questions Sticker, to have fun with her fans.
For instance, during the press tour for Big Little Lies, Witherspoon used the Questions feature to ask her fans for theme song recommendations for the tour. Later, she posted some of her favorites.
Ultimately, the Questions Sticker is a chance to have fun with followers and post lighter, more entertaining content. If your brand is heading to a conference, you might use Witherspoon’s tactic to ask followers a good “theme song for the conference” or “favorite ice breakers to use at a conference”. Plus, posting their responses shows them you’re listening, and might make other followers more willing to partake in future Questions you post.

9. Announce new releases.
Starbucks playfully quizzed their followers with a question that added up fire, chocolate, and sun emojis, and said “The __ _____ is coming back…”. Starbucks then posted followers responses throughout the day, before finally posting one page with the “correct” answer — “S’mores Frappuccino”.
By building suspense (and showcasing some funny followers’ responses), Starbucks successfully created excitement around their new product while quickly (and cost-efficiently) spreading the word. You might consider using a similar strategy when announcing an upcoming new product or event.

10. Survey your followers.
Want to know how your followers feel about a particular topic, or what their preferences are? You can use the Questions Sticker as a feedback form. 
Whether you ask your audience their opinion on a recent event or ask an open-ended question they can provide the answer to, using Instagram Questions can provide insightful qualitative data about what matters most to your online community.
Luggage company Beis used a Q&A session about their newest product to survey their audience about what product they’d like to see next.
11. Play “caption this.”
Want to get a little silly? Post a fun image on your Instagram Story and use a Questions Sticker titled “Caption This” to boost engagement. Share the funniest or best responses you get to your story to keep the conversation going. 
12. Generate new content ideas.
It’s a good idea to use the Questions Sticker as an opportunity to ask followers what they want to see more or less of on your feed — it can help your team brainstorm more content while ensuring you’re making viewers feel like their opinion is valuable to your brand.
Use the Sticker and ask your audience “What content would you like to see more of?” to help guide your content strategy for Instagram, your company blog, or even a podcast.
13. Have your followers submit questions for an upcoming Livestream.
Is Instagram Live part of your content plan? Generate excitement and buzz for an upcoming live by using the Questions Sticker to collect questions ahead of time.
Not only will this boost engagement on your stories, but it could help viewers tune into your live in hopes of getting their questions answered.
14. Ask for recommendations.
You can also use the question sticker to ask your audience for recommendations. Content creator Carissa Stanton hosts monthly book clubs on her Instagram account and uses the Questions Sticker to ask her audience for book recommendations.
If your company is opening a location in a new city, you can use the Instagram Questions Sticker to ask your community what their favorite hot spots are in that city. Or if you host a podcast or YouTube channel, ask your community who they’d like to see featured on your next episode.;
15. Use the questions sticker to facilitate an Instagram takeover.
Instagram takeovers typically involve having a guest post Stories from their perspective for a set period of time. Using the Questions Sticker allows your audience to get to know the guest better and provides a bit more structure to the takeover.
Skincare brand Summer Fridays does this via its “Ask a Derm” Instagram Story segment, where a professional dermatologist will take over the account to answer skincare-related questions from the audience.
Your Instagram takeover guest can use the Questions Sticker to take questions for an “ask-me-anything” session or ask them about their favorite products or offerings related to your brand.
16. Create a weekly content series.
Looking for more consistent content ideas? Use the Questions Sticker as part of a weekly content offering on your Instagram account. Choose a day each week to post the Questions Sticker, with a standing prompt to build engagement and loyalty.
Each week on her Instagram Stories, creator Olivia Noceda hosts a series called “Worth the Hype” where her followers will put a brand or product in the sticker and she’ll share her thoughts on whether the product is worth checking out or not.
Implementing a similar strategy can build a sense of trust with your audience, and gives them a reason to keep coming back to your Stories on a regular basis.
The Instagram Questions feature is a great way to encourage conversation with the people who follow your account, creating a more engaging social media experience.

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Email delivers a return on investment of 3600%, making it the best digital marketing strategy. The fact that email is free and highly effective means it’s prime for driving revenue. However, there’s one nuisance that hangs around email marketing like a bad smell, and that’s junk email.  As of September 2021, out of 105 billion…
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I just inherited a Hubspot/SFDC instance that’s 5 years old and not very well kept. One ask from Demand Gen has been “what channels are working for us”? We haven’t been diligent about using UTM parameters or SFDC campaigns, so I feel like we don’t have that visibility. In Marketo, I would use UTM parameters to parse leads into different SFDC campaigns based on UTM values, but I’m not sure what the best way to do this within Hubspot. I’ve also been looking into Bizible/CaliberMind attribution platforms as well, but won’t have budget for that until 2023. In the meantime, how should I structure Hubspot/SFDC in order to best capture channel attribution? submitted by /u/lancebass2000 [link] [comments]

In early 2011, I decided to take a massive leap of faith and do something I had been putting off for quite some time—quit a stable job and start my public relations agency. I knew this would be challenging. But, I wasn’t ready to live with the regret of not trying. So, on I went and launched Prohibition PR. What a ride this has been.I started with a small personal blog discussing new social media trends and issues. Lucky for me, blogging wasn’t as competitive as it is today. Back then, you just needed to write a good blog and have it optimized correctly. That brought in decent traffic. It’s also through the blog that I got my first few clients. Now we’ve grown into a medium-sized PR and social media agency.After over a decade of running the agency, I would love to say that I’ve mastered the “agency life.” But that would be far from the truth. I still get surprises now and then. Clearly, I don’t know everything, and there’s still a lot to learn. However, I’ve picked critical lessons along the way that I would like to share with you in this post.Let’s jump right in.1. Network with creative peopleNetworking is one of the most interesting lessons I learned in the first few years of running a PR and social media agency. And not for the obvious reasons everyone knows about. Sure, networking is a great way to establish business connections and acquire clients. However, when you network with the right people, the benefits go well beyond that.For starters, you get exposure to how other people run their businesses. Over the years,  I’ve interacted with public relations experts, marketers, entrepreneurs, journalists, and other professionals. While most share many similarities, they also run their businesses differently. So why is all that important?The exposure has helped me learn so much about how different industries operate. Not only that, but I’ve also gained insights into how other entrepreneurs operate their businesses. These insights have been instrumental in creating bold social media PR campaigns for our clients. In addition to that, they shaped my leadership approach in our PR and social media agency.What does all this mean, though? Drop the tunnel vision, and look at networking through a wider lens. Most professionals think of networking as an opportunity to get connections for potential partnerships. Or receive “hacks” that’ll help them land more clients. I have no problem with any of that. But, there is much more to gain from good networking.Good networks give you fresh ideas and open your mind to greater things. Naturally, this will benefit your company and the clients you want to help. But that’s not all.I must also point out that not every event you attend will lead to real business or connections. I’ve attended and spoken at lots of real-life networking events over the years. But, honestly, most of them were just terrible.That was especially the case back in the early 2010s when social media marketing was not as mainstream as it is today. So I would get to the stage and describe how social media is vital to stand out and much cheaper than traditional marketing, but most people were still not ready to pay attention to the channel.To cut the long story short, networking is vital, and attending events is key. However, I’ve learned first-hand not to rely on these events completely. They won’t be the magic bullet you need to take your agency to the next level. At least not all of them. That’s why it’s also wise to rethink your networking strategy.Adopting a multifaceted networking strategy can prove very helpful, for example. That means going beyond the common industry-specific seminars and tradeshows. You’ll need to explore other networking events like career fairs, community service groups, and alumni meetups.2. Always be accessible to your clients and teamIt’s fair to say that every agency strives to grow and to have a stable supply of satisfied clients. But unfortunately, as agencies grow and acquire more clients, it becomes easier to lose sight of the importance of maintaining a personal touch with every client. And honestly, it truly gets harder to stay in touch with every client when what started as a solo adventure grows into a massive agency with dozens of clients – I’ve seen this first hand.When I started Prohibition PR in 2011, it was pretty easy to maintain that spark with my handful of clients. But as time passed and more clients came on board, the whole thing became more challenging. Having worked with international consultancies, I can also tell you that even larger companies with more resources struggle to stay accessible to their clients. And that’s a huge problem.Like B2C customers, your agency’s clients need that personal touch. They need to feel valued. Having access to you through email, SMS, or a cloud-based telephone are some of the effective ways of reassuring them. Fail to deliver that, and another agency will come along and take your clients without breaking a sweat.That’s why it’s so important to be good at time management. You have to create time for your clients. And when your baby agency grows into an adult, you’ll want to invest in qualified client account managers immediately. Train them to ensure they live and breathe your brand values. But more importantly, keep your doors open. Make yourself accessible to your employees because they are a vital connection to your clients.Speaking of employees, I’ve always believed that agencies should strive to win awards to attract the best talents. When I started the agency, I wanted to win an award as soon as possible. I wanted to have an easier time attracting the best talents, and I knew candidates would want to join a growing and winning agency. So I worked hard and went the extra mile for our clients. As a result, the agency started earning recognitions, and now we are PRCA’s Best Medium-Sized PR consultancy of 2022.3. Accept criticismEmbracing criticism is one of the hardest lessons I’ve learned over the years. Of course, that’s to be expected, especially in the PR world. But I didn’t expect that I’ll explain to clients that they need to grow a thick skin and learn to embrace criticism.A good PR and social media agency can manage a crisis and build your brand image. Make no mistake about that. But what they cannot do is make your brand immune to criticism. No one can do that. So even if you deliver the best in class services, there will always be a customer with some criticism. And it could be legitimate or not.But here is the thing. You don’t have to fight criticism because your agency can benefit from it. I’m talking about meaningful and constructive criticism – when a client complains about a product that failed to do this or that. Or your customer support is taking too long to pick up calls. This criticism can help you improve your product and refine the client experience.Therefore, learn to accept criticism. Have the confidence to own up to complaints raised by clients—even more so when it’s done publicly. Then, be swift at responding to the criticism and showing what you’re doing to resolve the problem permanently.Check this out:SourceMajor brands like Apple have done this before when they faced criticism. For example, in 2015, Taylor Swift criticized Apple for not paying artists whose music was streamed during a user’s free trial. Apple owned up and issued a public apology through senior vice president Eddy Cue. In addition to the apology, they fixed the issue.But there’s another perspective to all this. Sometimes agencies find themselves in trouble because they promise something they cannot deliver. This is particularly a problem with newer agencies that are too desperate to impress and acquire clients. You promise to grow a client’s revenue by X percent within a few weeks. The client gets impressed and comes on board. Then, you fail to deliver on your promise, and the client feels cheated.Impressing potential clients with wild targets can help you acquire a few customers, but it’s not a sustainable strategy. Too often, the client gets disappointed and starts talking to other people about their experience. That’s why I always advise agency owners to be honest. Don’t promise the world to the client just to secure that paycheck. Experienced clients will see right through your lies. And those who don’t will be disappointed when you ultimately fail to deliver. Either way, you’re not doing your agency or brand any favors.4. Pulse check your business with client surveysDo you know what’s worse than losing a client? Losing a client out of the blue. It’s one thing for a client to end a contract after a few rough months with them. It’s something else when a client suddenly ends a contract.Your business is taking a hit in both cases. However, the latter scenario may signal a bigger problem. You’re not doing enough to track the satisfaction of your clients and the overall performance of your business.Failing to evaluate your business and clients allows performance issues to creep in. Worse still, these issues will fall through the cracks. And that’s when you start seeing clients raising a long list of issues spanning several months. Unfortunately, there is very little you can do to retain such clients at that point.To ensure your agency is on the right track, you must continuously evaluate your performance and client happiness. Better yet, allow your clients to evaluate your business. And you don’t even need a long client survey for this. In fact, in my experience, I’ve found shorter client surveys to be more effective. I’m talking 2-3 questions max.First and most important, you want to know how happy the client is. You could pose this as a question or use other variations. For example, how likely are you to recommend our services? Let the client pick an answer on a scale of 0 to 10.A happy client will always pick a high number. For unhappy clients, you’ll want to handle the root cause of their unhappiness swiftly. For example, I would consider clients unhappy if they pick any number from six going down.The follow-up question should give you qualitative data. What can we do better? This open-ended question will provide you with tons of data to work with. Use the answers to improve the customer experience and satisfaction.How frequently should you conduct client surveys? The frequency may vary depending on your project and contract with the client. Make sure you’re not surveying the clients too frequently or less frequently. Do it too often, and you’ll come off as insecure. Meanwhile, if you don’t do it frequently enough, you’ll likely lose touch with your clients.At Prohibition PR, we usually do quarterly surveys with our clients on long-term contracts. As for the project-based clients, we usually adjust the frequency depending on the timeline and scope of the project.5. Tap into the power of social mediaUnhappy customers are more likely to share their experiences than happy customers. Most marketers already know that. It’s also well known that most negative experiences are shared on social media. And it can take a single tweet or thread to burn a brand’s reputation.Fortunately, social media is just as powerful for building brands and delivering results to your clients. That’s why we incorporate the channel when formulating our public relations strategies. We’ve used social platforms countless times to provide excellent results for our clients.Take the 2017 social media campaign we did for Watches of Switzerland (WoS) as an example. WoS wanted to boost its profile at Baselworld 2017, a renowned global watch tradeshow. So we created engaging content for the campaign, including teaser videos, animated Gifs, etc. We also brought a production company on board to assist with creating a Facebook Live debate.SourceThe social media campaign helped WoS dominate the Baselword 2017 conversation. They had 363% more content than the competition. As a result, their social media audience and engagements also went through the roof.For our agency, social media has also become instrumental in acquiring leads. We get more inquiries about our services through social media, LinkedIn specifically, than from search. I would get the “Hi Chris, would you be interested in helping with this?” DMs from people who’ve interacted with our brand in different capacities. Some are referrals, others from an event they saw me.It is quite interesting that most of them opt to reach out via LinkedIn instead of the official website. Perhaps people prefer knowing they’re talking to the guy in charge instead of a random employee handling inquiries?To cut a long story short, you need social media to grow your agency and deliver results to your clients. And this applies to virtually all industries. So, supplement your in-house content hub and the clients’ strategies with appropriate social media content.6. Be confidentIf most successful people share one recurring theme, it is self-confidence. Most businesses start with a calculated risk. An entrepreneur quits their full-time job with all sorts of benefits to start their own business. Some would even venture into a completely different industry. We’ve heard these stories before.And while not all such stories have a good ending, they’re all critical in one way or another. If the venture works, brilliant. If it doesn’t, at least now you know the “million-dollar idea” you had doesn’t work. So you won’t live with the “what if” regret.The bottom line is you need the self-confidence to achieve your full potential. You must believe in your skills and abilities enough to pursue them. Even if starting a new venture or going after a massive client that seems out of reach, you must try.Also, it doesn’t have to be during those big decisions. You’ll need your confidence even in seemingly minor situations like voicing your opinions during client briefings, suggesting different approaches, etc.Sometimes, you’ll need the confidence to walk away from contracts or clients that aren’t a good fit. Is that a difficult decision to make? Absolutely. But think about this: is it worth bringing a client on board when you know your services can’t resolve their problems?In ClosingBuilding a PR and social media agency has taught me invaluable business and life lessons. In this review, I shared some of the top lessons. First, you need to network with creative people. And don’t just look at networking as a means to land more business partners and clients. Think beyond that.Second, stay accessible to your clients. Growth is good and all, but it won’t be sustainable if you grow distant from the very clients you’re working for. Next, pulse-check your business. Keep your clients satisfied and happy. Then, use social media, accept criticism, and be confident.Hopefully, you’ve learned a thing or two from these lessons. They may not provide a foolproof hack into successful entrepreneurship, but they should help you make more informed decisions.💡Do you also run an agency? Then, start using Buffer to manage your clients’ social presence easily.