A New Way for Brands to Tell Stories on Instagram

Instagram helps brands share stories through imagery. And since it began offering a way for advertisers to reach people on Instagram in 2013, IG heard from marketers that they want to tell sequenced stories in beautiful, compelling ways that lead to meaningful results for their businesses.

They’ve also received feedback from the Instagram community that they are interested in learning more about a brand or product after they have been inspired by a sponsored photo or video.

So, IG introduced a new format we’re calling carousel ads – a new way for brands to share more images with people interested in their posts.

Carousel ads give brands more flexibility in telling their stories by allowing people who view their ads to swipe left to see additional images and link to a website of the brand’s choice.

 

One way to look at it is carousel ads bring the potential of multi-page print campaigns to mobile phones – with the added benefit of taking people to a website to learn more. For instance, a fashion company could use the carousel to deconstruct the individual products in a ‘look.’ A car company might share an array of different features of a vehicle and provide a link to learn more about the new model. Or, an advertiser could showcase how multiple ingredients come together to make a delicious meal.

As with all photo and video ads, people who don’t want to know more can simply scroll past carousel ads in their feed.

Instagram introduced this new format on a limited basis. In the coming weeks, you may see carousel ads and might notice variations of the format as we learn what people are most interested in and what performs best.