Instagram is burning it up with new features. The changes at Instagram seem to be coming almost every week. If you aren’t using Instagram regularly, you need to get started. Instagram is a fun platform with a lot of fun features. In this episode, we’ll go over some of the newest features and talk about the best ways to use them.

List of Changes at Instagram that Will Impact Your Community

Re-sharing Feature in Stories

This is a new feature that allows you to re-share within your account without using a third-party app. It’s similar to a retweet in Twitter. It shares the post to your story.

• It turns a photo into a sticker and inserts it into your stories.
• It’s a great way to connect with people more.
• The tagging feature doesn’t always work, so you may have to do it manually if it doesn’t do it automatically.
• Access your settings from your profile screen if you don’t want others to share your photos in their stories and turn the feature off.

Story Camera Features

It’s challenging to perfect the art of the perfect 15-second story, but there are apps like Storeo that can help with recording it. Here is a list of some of the features inside the Instagram camera.

• Type allows you to create a screen with text to describe what you’re talking about in your story. This can be added to a highlight (see the bottom of story for more about highlights) and serve as a cover page to tie your stories together, get responses from people and spark conversation.
• Live, which is the livestreaming option, can also be saved into your highlights which will build your relationship and help with community building.
• Boomerang is an oldie but goodie. It records for 2 seconds and then loops.
• Superzoom zooms in on something and adds special elements like stars and colors.
• Focus is a portrait feature which blurs the background of your photo or video and makes the subject of the video stand out.
• Handsfree is a feature that gives you 15 seconds handsfree video without having to hold the button down.
• Rewind allows you to play a recorded video backwards.
• Stop Motion takes bursts of pictures and strings them all together.

Stickers in Stories

After you’ve taken a photo, you have a number of options you can use “like” stickers, freehand drawing, and text. You can use stickers or text to mention someone in your story. Clicking on the @mention will take you to the person’s profile.

• Slider Polls allows you to insert a basic “yes or no” poll in your story. You can also input your own short answers to choose from, but you’re limited on space and may only use two.
• Hashtag Stickers allows you to quickly add a hashtag to your story. Also, you can now follow a hashtag on Instagram.
• Location enables you to share your location wherever you’re at- your neighborhood, a place of business or event. It gives people in the area the ability to see your posts based on your location. If people are looking at stories by location, it’s likely they will see yours.

Instagram Highlights

This new change at Instagram is available, but underutilized. The Highlight feature allows you to extend your stories past 24 hours. Highlights appear as a circle on your profile page under your bio. People can see about 4-5 of them, though you can add more that people can swipe to see. You can use a text or emoji title up to 11 characters. Use Highlights to show off your very best content.

Upcoming Features

Instagram will likely be launching the following changes at Instagram in the near future.

• Time tracking app
• Online Payment Market
• Muting users
• Tagging Facebook
• Video Calling
• Slow-mo
• Calendar View
• Floating Emoji Reactions

Listen Now

We recently interviewed Sue B Zimmerman, who specializes helping business owners to grow their Instagram accounts, about how to use Instagram for communities. Listen to her insightful episode.

Links to Tools and Resources Mentioned:

• Instagram Now Lets You Share Other People’s Photos in Stories
• Instagram is letting users share posts directly to their stories
• Instagram officially launches re-sharing of posts to Stories
• Storeo for Instagram
• What Is Instagram’s Emoji Slider Poll? This New Feature Is Making Stories Even More Interactive
• How to use the ’emoji slider’ on Instagram
• Instagram will soon show users how much time they spend in the app
• Instagram is Bursting into the Online Payment Market
• All the new rumored Instagram features that might kick Snapchat’s…