IG Reels + Guides to Grow your following

We’ll break down what IG Reels and Guides are, go into why they are features to help YOU grown, and how you can get started.

What are IG Reels?

Instagram Reels is a feature that allows you to share interactive content within 15-30 seconds with your audience. Most REELS will be educational, inspirational, entertaining, or promotional. This will come in a form of original ideas with authentic content that stays relevant longer.

What are IG Guides?

The Guides feature is particularly interesting to me, as a shop owner because I can answer common questions in a guide. It takes all of 5 minutes to make, and it repurposes old content. We’ve had more engagement on older posts because we were able o highlight a certain collection or item using a Guide.

Why should I use IG Reels + Guides?

REEL particularly has a HUGE reach opportunity. This gets more people to actively engage with you as well as grow your following. Who knows, you might have a video explode and generate 100+ followers.

For example, Vertical Ledge had a random, low-quality video hit upwards of 250K views over the course of 2 weeks, and it brought in 300 followers who were genuinely interested in our brand.

Guides can help your potential customers get the information they are looking for FAST and easy and all in one spot bundled up with a bow on top.

How will using REELS + GUIDES serve my audience?

This is a valid question. Adding yet another form of media can feel daunting and unnecessary but this particular feature we have been loving because it can be straightforward, and you can reuse content to create videos over time. This makes it less of a burden and more fun!

Tips on Getting Started:

There are 5 main categories to share content on IG Reels:

Create Authentic Content that Resonates with Your Audience
Inspire someone with your background story
Share Educational Content
Showcase Products
Be Entertaining/goofy/ silly- your quirky self

Be sure to join our new IG page SMALL BUSINESS HUB, INSIDERS to join our upcoming challenge in March. We’ll be kicking off Spring with a POSTS + REELS + GUIDES challenge. Each day will be tasked with creating content that answers a specific question along with a type of post like a reel, static image, or making a guide.

Creative Ideas for handmade artisans for REELS prompts:

Show a PART of your creative process
- If you make it a sequence, it allows your audience to stay engaged
Show your studio, where all the magic happens
- yes, this might mean you need to clean it up a bit and light a candle
Show your routine for getting started on your craft
- Like, do you have any tips on how to stay focused or be more efficient?
Can you show off your product using funny voice-overs?
- there are TONS of funny voice-overs, simple start interacting with other peoples REELS and you can save their audio to use for later
Answer a commonly asked question
- this is a great way to get in front of the camera and simply answer a question
Day in the life
- Short clips/timelapse of your day as a maker
Hop on a trend
- there are some fun trends going around ALL THE TIME, all you have to do is reuse the audio and put your own spin on it
Show a BEFORE/AFTER of your raw materials VS finished items
Introduce yourself
Show off your packaging process
Make a shop announcement using REELS
Teach your audience some kind of way to “care” for your products or items, educate them in some way about your item
Show your audience how you find inspiration for your items
Showcase a product or service
Give solutions to your audience’s pain points or challenges
Show your business behind the scenes
Introduce yourself or the team
Teach something
Share inspiration or support
Ask for the opinion of your audience on a new design or collection
Community Spotlight on your favorite maker or market
Share your favorite new “HACK”
Share your editing programs or top APP picks for your small business

Be sure to join our new IG page SMALL BUSINESS HUB, INSIDERS to join our upcoming challenge in March. We’ll be kicking off Spring with a POSTS + REELS + GUIDES challenge. Each day will be tasked with creating content that answers a specific question along with a type of post like a reel, static image, or making a guide.