Instagram’s new ‘Ask Me A Question’ feature is exciting and new. By now, you have likely seen lots of your friends sharing 50 stories, filled with silly questions and inside jokes from friends. As a blogger or influencer, this is asking your story views to slowly drop as the questions become useless to your audience. Nobody wants to bore their Instagram following. We always strive for engagement and click-throughs but ensuring that our feed and stories stay amazing at all times can be hard work, with so many new features constantly added to the app.

1. Answer the most interesting questions – inside jokes from your friends won’t always entertain your audience, as tempting as they are to post. Keep those for your private or personal profile. Remember your audience, and what they’ll engage best with. Tag brands in your answers, too. It can help to build relationships.

2. Link a blog post or article of yours attached to the question. Adding a plug to an existing source of information about you – especially monetised content – can work well for fashion and beauty influencers. Remember to disclose affiliate links, though. The ASA guidelines still apply to your stories.

3. Make it interesting. You can add a photo behind the answer or pick a colour. Your Instagram stories should always be cohesive and somewhat neat. Align your stories to your profile aesthetic. Don’t just answer the question – make sure that people want to click to the next question! You could create a layout on Unfold app or Canva beforehand for your stories.

Be inventive. Planning your content in advance is what makes the difference between “okay, her profile is nice….” content and “wow! Let’s check out her page some more!” This extends to your stories, too. Too many flashy, bright colours will put people off.