Instagram's Move to Link Stickers From Swipe Up Links
“Instagram has announced that from the 30th August 2021 swipe up links will be replaced by link stickers”
It’s officially time to retire the term ‘swipe up’ from our social media vocabulary! With the phrase well and truly drilled into our brains, we’ll bet that we’ll still be saying it a year on from now. But, much to the delight of all us social media folk, Instagram has announced that they’ll be rolling out link stickers in place of swipe up links from the 30th August 2021. How long this will take to actually roll out is another story, but it’s best to learn now what it’ll mean for your brand so you can stay ahead of social media’s ever changing curve. In this post we’re going to discuss what this means for you; the pros, the cons and of course a handy little to-do list for you to follow.
Ready to dive in?
What this means for your brand
So what does this all mean for us, the users? For now brands and creators with over 10,000 followers start to see the shift from swipe up (found on the top panel as a chain link icon) to link stickers (found on stickers where you find all your other tools such as polls and questions). A lot of smaller brands/creators were hoping to see this roll out across the board, at the moment this isn’t the case. Hope isn’t lost though, Vishal Shah, Instagram’s Head of Product has noted that link stickers is currently being tested on a small pool of smaller accounts to see how they would be used. For now smaller brands/smaller creators can make the most of tools like linkin.bio and creating amazing content.
Don’t forget, if you are a small brand/creator you still have some ‘swipe up’ options. You can include a swipe up link to you IGTV videos and if you’re a business you can enable your shop, which you can swipe up to as well as add stickers that link to the products on your Instagram shop!
So back to the brands/creators with over 10,000 followers, instead of using the classic swipe up, now you will be heading over to your stickers section to find the link sticker and adding that on to your story. The link can be placed anywhere within the 16:9 display and will show the first part of the domain. As this is early days for the change, we’ll be interested to see how this plays out for interactivity. Perhaps being more visible will help brands/creators take more of their social audience onto their links.
Pros
They’re more visible and engaging: we already know that add engagement tools like polls and question boxes to your Instagram Stories guarantees more engagement. So if we apply the same rule to link stickers, this can only be a benefit right? Plus, rather than a small arrow at the bottom of our screens, we as the user can place them anywhere on the 16:9 screen, making them more obvious to audiences!
They show the domain: unlike the classic swipe up, link stickers will show the first part of the domain (i.e. ‘thedoers’ for our website!) - why is this great, you ask? Well by showing the domain this creates more trust between the audience and the brand/creator. No more sneaky affiliate links!
It’s a shiny new feature: as with anything new, we’ll all want to play with the new toy right? Expect an increased interest as this rolls out, think carefully how you could use this to your brand’s advantage!
Cons
It’s still only for users with over 10k at the moment: this news currently doesn’t effect those with less than the much coveted 10,000 followers. Don’t worry though, as we mentioned earlier Instagram are running tests on this currently.
Change of language: ‘swipe up’ has been well and truly drilled into our brains. For those who often do chatty stories, don’t forget to teach your audiences the new lingo - don’t assume non-marketers know about this big old change. Education is everything!
Change of design: Time to head over to our Canva templates and do some updating. Make sure to remove any reference to ‘swipe up’ and make changes to the layout to include the ability to move the link sticker anywhere on the design.
What you’ll need to do
Right, it’s time to add a few things to your to-do list! Remember, the sooner these changes are made, the easier it’ll be to keep ahead of the curve:
Head to your Canva templates and update any reference to ‘swipe up’
Educate your audiences with the new lingo
Check through your story highlights and re-do any important links
Pat yourself on the back for being ahead of the curve with link stickers!
All in all, as with most Instagram features, we’re sure this will only mean good things for your brand. Don’t forget to pay attention to your analytics and see how they new feature is changing how your audiences interact with links!
