Instagram Stories have been a huge success ever since they were made possible. However, there are drawbacks. For example, it is not so easy to share Instagram Stories and it is not possible to simply like them ‘silently’. A DM with hearts is immediately sent to that person. Bit of an exaggeration, isn’t it? Instagram gets it, because it comes with a like button for Stories.
Like an Instagram Story
It’s always a bit of a dilemma: if I like someone’s Stories now, they immediately get a DM (Direct Messages). This makes people feel a bit more obliged to reply to your like, while that is not the case at all with the likes under the regular photos in the timeline. Nice in itself that it is a ‘conversation starter’, but sometimes it is a bit exaggerated and you can even choose not to like something, while you do appreciate it.
That is now coming to an end, because Instagram boss Adam Mosseri has announced that there will be a private like button. That sounds very exciting, but it really just means that you can now give likes to Stories, without this immediately appearing in someone’s DMs. So as a story maker you will not receive a notification that you have a DM, only that a like has arrived (although that will of course also depend on your settings). Especially if you get a lot of likes on stories, your phone can sometimes flood with notifications and that is annoying.
Not sliding in the DMs
You can expect a heart icon between the text and the plane soon at the bottom of an Instagram Story. You can tap on that to give away a like that will not shoot in the DMs. Perfect. For example, the creator of the message does not receive a private message, but he or she can see who has shared a like. This works in the same way as checking the answers to a poll in a Story: just swipe up on your story to see it.
Quite intense, because you not only see who has viewed your story, but also who has given you a like. In short: you can see exactly who is watching but not liking. You can only see that yourself: other users do not see the likes. So it is not clear to others how many likes a story has or who has distributed a like. This will remain private, without having to end up in the private messages. Good news for people who like to ask if others want to slide into their DMs, because that is just a bit more fun with a message than with a like.