Ad Gab: How to Create Effective Story Ads

 It has to start somewhere. It has to start some time. What better place than here? What better time than now?
 You're listening to the Radcast. If it's radical, we cover it. Here's your host, Ryan Alford.
 Hey guys, what's up? Welcome to today's ad gap episode. It's a little different today, um,
 because I am pleading to charge here. Exactly, but we still have Josh. And so that's what's keeping us normal.
 And yeah, so today's ad gap is covering story content and why it's important. Story ads,
 specifically, and why those are important. Josh, you know, you have a lot of opinions on this.
 I'm just gonna let you kick it off. And first of all, like, why are story ads important? And what
 is the difference between a story ad and a post that you're posting to your Instagram or your Twitter
 or whatever, that's also an ad. Like what would be the difference there? Yeah. Well, first off,
 welcome to ad gap. Yeah, right. Your first ad gap. I know. It's crazy. Wow. It's actually kind of wild.
 Yeah, stories. Stories are really cool because they're a lot more casual than a entire newsfeed post.
 It's waste water. It's only up for 24 hours. Most people know this. Stories are kind of available
 on most platforms now. They're on like they started on Snapchat and then Instagram kind of copied it
 and really kind of owned it now. Now Facebook has it. Twitter has it. LinkedIn has it for some
 got awful reason. But the Instagram ones are the most. Yeah, those fleets. Did those even go
 anywhere? Have anything even happened with those? Like what is happening? I saw like three and then
 no one else has posted fleets anymore. But that's hilarious. I feel like maybe three LinkedIn
 stories here and there. But that is funny. Just like a weird way. It was a very weird one.
 That one came and went. So guys met my business meeting. Yes. But Instagram is really
 cool because it's become like almost more popular than the actual newsfeed. More people are posting
 stories because it's like more casual. You can do quick announcements without having to do a whole
 post come up with a caption and everything. And then also it's really because of that anytime
 there's a lot of people like within a certain area of a platform. That brings up a lot more
 opportunity to have ads there. Now you can have story ads which are super effective. They've been
 around for a few years. But it's one of those social media. Even when things are around for a
 long time, like it still takes a long time for people to jump on board for like a lot of best
 practices to come out. And with social media it's always going to change like how to use them well.
 Absolutely. Well you've even said before. I mean you feel like sometimes people aren't,
 you said this before on an ad game. I'm pretty sure that sometimes people aren't actually using
 story ads like the most efficient way possible. So like that's why I think it's good we're
 getting into this today. So again, welcome to ad gav. Yeah. And super intense story ads.
 Why they're important. Josh is going to take it away. So story ads. First off,
 these are really great for like building awareness because when people are watching stories,
 they're kind of looking for entertainment. They're seeing what their friends are up to.
 It's a good point. What businesses are up to. And so in between those stories you're watching as
 you're clicking through scrolling through watching, like that's where your story at is going to
 appear. And so you want to kind of frame it within that context of we're we're trying to push
 our message in here in between people's like catching up with their friends. Right. Right. Right.
 What they're actually interested in. Like what they're there for. And we're kind of like we're
 interrupting them. So you want to make it in a way of like I do like your ad should be kind of
 entertaining and informative where it's like right. Hey, look like real quick before you get
 back to your next story. Like here's this piece of information. Yeah, exactly. You have to see
 later, man. Exactly. You have to make it like enough. I catching enough to where someone is going
 to want to stop and then be like, Oh, wait, what was that? And go back real quick. Because like,
 I feel like most I mean, I'm putting myself here. Yeah. Like I'm going through and I'm like,
 click, click, click, click. And I'm just like going through. But if something obviously is catching
 my eyes, something is, you know, giving me information that I'm actually wanting. I'm like,
 Oh, wait, I need to go back. Yeah. And then you know, you click the back button. But if you're not
 making an eye catching, yeah, that's going to hit that key is like when you're making eye catching,
 you got to think like like a lot of people are like, Oh, it's an eye catching image. That'll work.
 It's like, no, it needs to be vertical. It needs to fill the entire story screen. And it has to
 have like either the picture, the product, the your logo, like something bright. And like the
 point of the message has to be there immediately. Right. If it's a video, if it's a video, there
 should be no waiting. There should be no fading in from black, no like build up. It needs to be
 there immediately. Because otherwise, I'm going to click past it. Everyone else is because that's
 kind of what stories are. So it's rapid fire. You're just throwing it in there and you're like
 stopping the rotating door almost. Right. Right. So what are ways to make things that are more
 eye catching? I mean, you know, do you do you feel like it's something that is with animation
 graphics? You know, do you do you throw in like something that's super, you know, animated
 you're doing an after effects or like, you know, what what's the game plan to make it feel like,
 okay, I'm going to stop on the story at it. And now like pay attention to it. Yeah. I mean,
 there's a lot of really cool things you can do. You can really lean into it being like an
 interesting photograph. It's like really immersive. Right. Have a video that has something
 interesting in it right away. I've seen like cool ones where it's like a coffee shop and it's
 just like a big splashing coffee mug right away. Oh, super cool. I wouldn't when big burger king
 did that like, oh yeah. Like you're thinking through it and it's just a full screen. Like you
 couldn't even see it. It was like half the burger. But it's taking the whole screen of your phone.
 And so it's just a big massive moldy wopper on your phone. Like that's eye catching. Absolutely.
 Um, but I see I see a lot of other ones where it's like, I've got my phone here where it's like
 a horizontal image where it's part of your phone. And there's like a big glob of text at the bottom.
 Like I'm not going to look at that. I think it's kind of it's boring. Right. I've got I've said
 this before. I've got memes to see. No, I got friends to stalk. No, exactly. Exactly. There's a lot
 of there's a lot of things to catch up there. Yeah. But like also using big text in graphics is
 really great. Okay. The captions are okay. But in like when you're in your Facebook ads manager
 too for people actually like getting and running it like you need to like I personally set up an
 entire different ad set where it's like that is dedicated to stories. Okay. Instead of I know a lot
 of people who are in that kind of like world are like, you know, there's like automatic placements
 where they'll put it on your newsfeed. They'll put it on your story stuff like that. If you
 are doing that make sure you're editing your post to be cropped when it's on the story placement
 like edit it for that. You want to optimize for where it's going and not just kind of like throwing
 it up and hoping it works. Yeah, you can't just like, I mean, you can't just like throw it out there
 and like kind of just say, oh, this one size fits all and then expect it to have like great results.
 Right. No, it's a really good point. How do you feel like people should like when after they
 post the story, do you feel like it's worth it to have all the information on one, you know,
 story? Do you feel like it's something that should be broken down? Like what have you seen that's
 the most efficient way to provide information but not so overwhelming that people are like, okay,
 there's so much stuff on here. I'm not going to like, I'm not going to take the time to read.
 You know what I mean? Like, how do you really break that down? I think you want to make it like
 bite sides. Like really, this story is especially are really digestible. Like, it's a snack. It's not
 your meal. Like, this is where you want to have just like, it's like a sample. You want to have
 like one point. I think of like, I think of like, like car commercials where it'll be like the
 all-new redesigned Toyota Camry. And then they're like, the only feature they'll call out in
 the ad of a 30-second like TV spot is like, we have a new Bluetooth system. And then it's like,
 they have nothing about like the handling, performance, whatever. It's a good point because they
 make it feel so intense and so like revolutionary. It's like, well, I mean, it's good marketing. But it's
 like, you know, it's like, it's like the wording, I mean, to your point about like the random Bluetooth
 or whether it's like, we have these new kind of like textural seats that are leather. And like,
 it's like, okay, actually, it's just leather seats that are just in a car, but like you made it
 sound cool. Like, you know, like, it's like, I mean, I think about that. Yeah. Like, you want to
 think like, narratively, it's like, they're only kind of calling out one point. And they're not going,
 they're not reading out the list of features you're getting. So like, I know with iPhone, like,
 Apple's always a big case study of stuff. When they camp the iPod, it's like, it's this many
 songs in your pocket. It's not a, oh, we've got storage, this much battery life. You can put pictures
 on it too. You can do this too. You can blah, blah, blah. It's like, no, like, you can put music on
 it. And that's all they said. Like, it's great. You want to be to the point because you're like,
 again, you're in the stories. You're a walking guy. But there are a lot of cool ways to like add more
 in. Okay. You can do if you need to put in more information. I've seen some really cool things where
 people do a video where it's like, you have your one piece of information on the front. Yeah.
 And then if people stick around to watch it, you can have some more later on. But like,
 you want to have, yeah, that's a good point. You want to have your key message. This is a social media
 advertising. Like, I'm not telling you how to make commercials right now. I'm trying to, like,
 YouTube videos or whatever, like, exactly. Have your point. This is just right at the beginning,
 right at the beginning. And that's it. Right. Like anything extra is for the people who are really,
 really interested. Because everyone else is not going to watch it. That's a good point. And then,
 another cool thing you can do, like, you can do carousels, which is like multiple slides per ad.
 I've seen some where people are like, hey, here's a heads up screenshot this next message.
 Right. And they'll be like, I've seen it for like a bar. It's like, here's the upcoming bands.
 Like, here's the upcoming events for the week. Or it's like, here's a coupon screenshot it so
 you can use it at checkout. That's a really effective way to like get more information to.
 Right. Right. No, I hear you. I hear you. Okay. So if you were to wrap this up, right? Like,
 if you were to say, you know, this is something that obviously should be done by any brand that's
 on Instagram, social media, Twitter, Snapchat, LinkedIn, whatever it is, right? You know, LinkedIn
 stores. But, you know, apart from that, what would be the thing you to write like if we had to
 wrap this up and say it and just like a few really good words? What would be your words of like
 encouragement of posting an Instagram? Yeah. Uh, sorry. I keep saying Instagram because I'm just,
 I feel like I use Instagram stores all the time. So I just immediately go to like Instagram.
 These are like the, this is the bread and butter of the main course of the story game.
 Absolutely. Absolutely. We haven't even said Facebook yet. Facebook stories right there.
 They exist. Yeah. But anyway, what would you use to? Um, I would say make it,
 make it entertaining if you can. Like that doesn't have to, I don't know, people get tied up with
 that word. Um, entertaining does not necessarily mean funny or it's good, but like entertaining can
 be beautiful. It can be serious. It can be anything. It just provides entertainment and it's like
 draws interest. Um, and then also like really simple. Just keep it like, keep it where it's like,
 leave, you want to like stories is kind of like a build interest, but like leave them wanting more.
 And that's kind of like you don't build interest by satisfying someone's entire curiosity.
 Right. Like then they are like, they're done at that point. No, right, right, right. No.
 So I think, I think that's kind of the key to like, the key approach to stories is just kind of like,
 keep it simple, keep it interesting. And that's honestly like kind of, that's kind of it.
 That's kind of it. You can keep it really casual. You don't have to be serious. You don't have to
 overthink it. You can, you can make it really organic. You can, I've seen major brands do
 like a selfie iPhone video that looks like it's from an old iPhone. Interesting. It's still really
 effective. Right, right, right. Well, um, I mean, I think this is good. Obviously, I think we've
 been really developing as, you know, part of ad gap, just like really getting into really technical
 social media kind of advertising tactics. And I think this is something that hopefully we'll see
 more in 2021, um, more brands using Instagram ads and Instagram stories ads specifically. And
 just other story ads, other story platforms, things like that to create more engagement. So
 hopefully that's something we see more of. Um, I know this was our super ad gaps are super quick,
 super technical, nitty-gritty kind of, uh, talk part of the radcast. But um, I know Josh,
 this is great. And I love thinking of this our first one. This is awesome. This is like a great
 little intro here. I'm talking about it's, you know, story ads. Yeah. Happy to have you on here.
 I'm gonna act like the host now. No, absolutely. Take it away, Josh. Take it away. I'll let you,
 I'll let you close it out, dude. Cool. Well, thanks for listening. If you have, have any questions,
 you can find us on social media, um, at Josh chill. And I don't know your, what your ad is, but
 whatever. It's okay. It's alright. I appreciate it. We're on Instagram. We're everywhere. We've got,
 I don't know, find us somewhere. Yeah. Yeah. If you guys are watching this, hopefully you guys are
 technically savvy so you can figure it out. I don't know. You're fine. Yeah. Well, I'll get,
 I'll give you our social media. So our social media channels, you can find the radcast at the
 radcast.com, Instagram at the.rad.cast. Um, Instagram, uh, the radcast is a product of radical
 company. So you can look up, um, radical at radical results on Instagram and visit us online as
 well at radicalcompany.com. And we will see you tomorrow when we release open mic. Stay, uh,
 we'll be back with me and Josh on that. We'll see you soon. Yeah. Yo guys, what's up, Ryan
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