Instagram attracts a young, gender-equitable population of two billion monthly active users, 90 percent of whom follow a business. Those figures alone should convince any business owner about the wisdom of using the platform for brand awareness and customer engagement.
Because it is a visual platform, recall tends to be much better than on other social networks. That might explain why Instagram has a better engagement rate than Facebook and Twitter, despite their larger market shares.
Another reason might be its active community. As of 2019, 500 million users post Instagram stories on their Android phones or iPhone every day. This was back when it only had one billion active users, so it is likely that the number of Instagram stories has likewise increased. That’s a lot of visual content generated.
However, every one of those Stories disappears from public view and goes into the Stories archive after 24 hours. That is just the nature of Instagram Stories.
While the transience might appeal to the FOMO trait in many people, that's a massive waste of social media content from a marketing perspective. Fortunately, the Instagram archive allows you to bring archived stories back into circulation.
Disclaimer: All screenshots included in this article are from an Android phone. Users of iOS devices may have a slightly different experience.
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What Is Instagram Archive and How Does It Work?
Instagram archive is a repository of all your posts and Stories that you choose to keep in your Instagram account. Everything in archive is only visible to you until you dust it off and take it out again. Note that you can only access archive tools from the Instagram app on your iPhone or Android device.
Instagram introduced the Stories archive feature in 2017, together with Stories Highlights. All Instagram Stories still expire after 24 hours from posting but automatically save to archive without having to screenshot it unless you disable it.
The purpose of the Instagram archive is to preserve Stories if you decide to bring them back. But they will not be visible to the public. You can share archived Stories to Your Story as a direct message to select people or Highlights.
How to Archive Posts on Instagram
The Instagram Stories archive is mainly for the preservation of Stories because those disappear after 24 hours, unlike posts. However, you can also archive posts if you want to remove them from your profile without deleting them permanently. Instagram will preserve all comments and likes. However, you have to archive it manually.
To archive posts on Instagram, do the following:
- In your Instagram app, tap your profile picture on the bottom right of the screen.
- Tap the post you want to archive.
- Tap the three dots on the upper portion of the post.
- Tap archive. The post will no longer be available on your page.
Helpful Ways to Use Instagram Archive to Engage Your Audience
The Instagram archive button keeps Stories available for you to use at a later date. Archive feature is useful when a story did not perform as expected the first time around or performed exceptionally well. Find helpful ways to use the Instagram archive section to engage your audience by leveraging your fans.
Create Highlights for Your Best Stories
Remember the Stories Highlights that Instagram launched together with the Stories archive? They represent two sides of the marketing coin because Stories Highlights is one of the best ways to use the save story feature of Instagram.
Stories Highlights does just that: highlight your best stories. When a story gets much traction the first time, you can multiply the effect by combining all the stories that performed well into one story.
You can integrate as many stories, photos, and videos you want to highlight even after adding them to your profile. Highlights appear right below your profile photo.
To create Stories Highlights, do the following:
1. Open Instagram and log in to the app.
2. Go to your profile and tap the plus (+) sign.
3. Select Story Highlight.
4. Select the stories you want to add. Tap Next
5. Create a title for your highlight.
6. If you want to use a custom cover image, tap Edit Cover.
7. Select the image you want and tap the arrow on the upper-right corner of the screen.
8. Tap Done (for Android) or Add (for iOS). You will see your newly created Highlight in Stories.
9. If you want to add photos or videos, tap and hold the highlight and tap Edit Highlight.
Share Memories
Instagram automatically creates Memories for posts in archive based on the dates you posted them originally. That makes a nifty way to share photos and videos for specific days and increase engagement. You will find your Memories under the Stories archive by date.
Tap on the date you want to share, and see a Share button. Tap on that, and the post will say, "Memories – MM-DD-YYYY." Tapping on Share To will allow you to share Memories of Your Story, selected people, or as a direct message.
For example, suppose you took many photos and videos during a hugely successful company-sponsored event a couple of months ago. Sending those as Memories to your customers can help them remember what a good job you did. The founding of your business is also a great way to engage current customers.
Test Drive Themes for Your Account
You don't have to create a unique look for your Instagram page, but having a recognizable theme helps with brand awareness and recall for a business page. Use the archived stories and posts to populate different page styles and colors to see what looks best with specific types of photos and videos. Try different combinations by archiving and returning posts and stories until you hit a winning combination.
Reinventing Old Posts
Posting new content on social media platforms takes a lot of time and effort, so you want to make the most of your creations. A clever way to accomplish that with Instagram posts and stories is to regularly archive those that enjoyed good traction and keep them out of circulation for a few weeks or months. Repost them with a new caption or in a different context and watch as they gain traction again.
Reuse Posts ad Stories That Underperformed
Instagram Insights gives you a pretty good idea of the performance of your posts and stories. If you think some of them are trending and deserve a second shot at the limelight, you can recall them from archive. It might just be an issue with the timing, boring text, or the incorrect use of hashtags. Tweak these accordingly and see what happens. You have nothing to lose.
Bonus Tip: An excellent way to increase engagement is to add polls to your Stories.
Did you know? The web version of Instagram does not have all the functions and features of the Instagram app. One example is archive feature, which is only available on the mobile app.
How Instagram Archive Can Help Promote Your Business
Instagram is an excellent platform for businesses to build brand awareness and customer engagement because it is a visual medium. Instagram posts are easy to digest and share, and 99.9 percent of Instagram users use at least one other social media platform. About 58 percent of consumers say they become more interested in a brand after seeing it on Instagram.
However, since 58 percent of Instagram users in the US check the platform every day, creating new content for a business profile page is a significant undertaking. You can save time and money by using the Instagram archive feature to reuse and repurpose content.
You can use archived posts and old Instagram stories to highlight your best moments, provide your target audience with fresh material regularly, and keep the brand on top of mind. All it needs is some creativity and archive button to pull it off.
Check Out the Archive App to Promote Your Online Business Today!
Instagram archive helps save Stories and curate and repurpose content. You can increase engagement and brand awareness while saving money. Of course, archive feature works best when you have been using Instagram for your business for a long time. You have lots of material to tap.
If you are a new user of Instagram, you might be able to create content based on user-generated Instagram Posts, Stories, and Reels about your company. If your e-commerce store is on Shopify, you’re in luck because you can use Archive App.
Archive App is the only app on Shopify that automatically finds and curates brand mentions on Instagram and TikTok for you to help you understand your customers and what they are saying. You can optimize this information to promote your brand more effectively and build a community.
Whether you use Instagram for your business or not, you will find that Archive App can help you grow and sustain your business. Find out more about Archive App and community marketing by visiting our website.
Are you ready to kick your Instagram game up a notch? Today, it's time to showcase your best work, increase engagement, and attract more followers with Archive App!
FAQs on Instagram Story Archive
How can I automatically save stories to the Instagram story archive?
The Save to archive feature is enabled by default. You can check if that’s the case for your page by going to your profile in the Instagram mobile app and tapping on the hamburger menu on the top right of the page. Tap Settings > Privacy > Story. Scroll down to check if Save to archive is enabled.
How can I put archived posts back on Instagram?
To return archived posts to your profile, do the following:
- In your Instagram app, tap your profile picture on the bottom right of the screen.
- Tap the hamburger menu on the top portion of the screen.
- Select Your activity.
- Scroll down and tap archived.
- Select the drop-down and tap Posts archive.
- Tap the post you want to return to your page.
- Tap the three dots on the top portion of the post and select Show on Profile.
How do I remove a story from my Stories Archive on Instagram?
Deleting a story from archive section involves the following steps:
- In your Instagram app, tap your profile picture on the bottom right of the screen.
- Tap the hamburger menu on the upper-right corner of the page and select Your Activity.
- Choose archived. Tap the story you want to remove from the Stories archive.
- Tap the three buttons on the bottom right portion of the story.
- Choose Delete twice in succession to confirm.
