Interactive Stories

Usually found on platforms such as Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, and TikTok, Interactive Stories differ from regular posts because they are temporary, often going away after 24 hours, and creating a sense of urgency or exclusivity for users to interact with them. These stories utilize interactive widgets such as polls to get users' opinions, visions to test users' knowledge, sliders to measure users' emotional responses, questions that invite users to interact with the story, and clickable links or stickers that direct users to other web content or product pages.

The two-way communication channel that makes the audience feel directly involved is the primary achievement of Interactive Stories. This is what makes a story interactive, after all — the audience has a say in the direction it takes and, by extension, in the virtual world that the storyteller creates. So, there you have it. If you’re a brand, an influencer, or just a plain old storyteller with a creative bent, Interactive Stories are tools that give you the appearance of humanizing your content, as they also provide you with foundations for the content that you can actually be creative with.

Basically, Interactive Stories on social media are short-lived media that have a unique set of features designed to encourage not just passive viewing but active participation and interaction by the audience. This storytelling format is particularly potent in the social media context because of its relationship- and visual-centric qualities.