Turn the moment someone replies to your Story—or tags your business in theirs—into a useful private conversation. Repli matches the interaction to your rule, sends the right DM, records the result and keeps the follow-up inside Instagram.
Start a flow when a viewer types a response to your Story. Match a keyword for a specific offer or use a broader rule for common questions.
Respond privately when another account mentions or tags your business in its Story. A catch-all rule works even when Meta provides no message text.
Keep Story rules separate from comment and ordinary DM rules. A keyword used for a Story reply does not have to control an unrelated trigger.
Send the next step in the DM: a concise answer, a link button, an image, a question or the opening message in a lead flow.
Use your own instructions to generate a reply from the viewer’s Story interaction. AI replies consume AI credits and can be replaced by fixed copy at any time.
Continue an eligible conversation with timed follow-ups, stopping when the person replies or uses one of your stop words.
Repli works with the messaging events and permissions available through Meta. It does not schedule Stories or manufacture engagement.
Sent and failed responses are logged against the connected Instagram account and automation rule, so one workspace cannot read another workspace’s activity.
A shop posts a new product and invites viewers to reply SIZE or PRICE. Each response receives the matching information privately, without crowding the Story itself.
A creator asks followers to reply GUIDE. Repli sends the resource button, then can ask one or two useful lead questions in the same conversation.
A customer tags the business in an unboxing Story. A mention rule sends a genuine thank-you and gives the team a clean starting point for a conversation.
A salon or coach uses BOOK as the Story call to action. The first response confirms the request and directs the person to the next booking step.
Instagram Story automation can describe several unrelated ideas. Some people mean scheduling a Story. Others mean automatically viewing Stories or producing artificial reactions. Repli does neither. Here, Story automation means responding to a real person after that person has interacted with your professional account: they either reply to a Story you published or mention your business in a Story of their own. The response happens in Instagram Direct, where the conversation can continue naturally.
That distinction matters because the trigger starts with the viewer. A Story is often where someone first shows intent without wanting to write a formal enquiry. They may type “price?”, react to a product demonstration, ask whether a place is available, or tag a brand after receiving an order. Repli turns that small signal into a clear next step rather than allowing it to disappear among the rest of the inbox.
The feature uses the same official Meta connection as Repli’s existing Instagram messaging tools. Story replies arrive as incoming message events. Story mentions can arrive as a mention attachment or a messaging referral. Repli reads the event, identifies the Instagram account it belongs to, looks for an active rule for that trigger and sends only the response configured for that account.
A Story reply is a message sent in response to your own Story. It normally contains text, so it works well with keyword rules. If a clothing brand posts three looks and says “Reply BLACK, BLUE or GREEN for details,” each word can open a different conversation. A coach might use PLAN, a restaurant might use MENU, and an estate agent might use VISIT. The keyword is not magic; it is simply a clear way to connect the Story’s call to action with the correct private answer.
A Story mention happens when another person puts your account into their Story. Meta may deliver the mention without useful text. That is why a mention automation can be configured as a catch-all: every valid mention can receive the first response even when there is no keyword to examine. The message might thank the customer, ask permission to continue the conversation, or invite them to share a detail. It should sound like something the team would genuinely say, not an indiscriminate sales pitch.
Keeping these as separate rules gives the marketer more control. A response to “Is this available?” should not sound like a thank-you for a tag, and a thank-you to a customer should not launch the same qualification flow as a price enquiry. Repli stores Story Reply and Story Mention as separate trigger types so their words, AI instructions and follow-ups can differ.
Start with the Story itself. Give the viewer one obvious action: “Reply GUIDE for the checklist,” “Reply SIZE for the chart,” or “Reply BOOK to ask about a slot.” A single, memorable word reduces spelling variation and makes the automation easier to test. You can add several accepted keywords when your audience naturally uses alternatives, but avoid turning the caption into a list of commands.
Next, write the first DM as a continuation of the Story. The person should immediately understand why it arrived. “Here is the size guide from today’s Story” is stronger than “Thank you for contacting us.” If the next step is a page, add a button with a clear label. If you need information before sharing the next step, ask one question at a time. Repli can connect the initial response to an existing lead form so the conversation collects details in sequence.
Finally, decide what should happen if the person does not answer. A follow-up can be useful when it completes an unfinished request, but it should not become a generic promotional sequence. Keep it within Meta’s allowed messaging window, stop it when the person responds, and use stop words for people who are no longer interested. The goal is to finish the conversation they started, not to keep messaging because an automation can.
A fixed response is the safest choice when the answer should always be the same. Delivery links, booking pages, size charts, opening instructions and campaign codes do not need generative text. Fixed copy is predictable, easy to approve and does not use AI credits. It also makes troubleshooting straightforward because the message in the log should match the message in the rule.
AI is useful when the incoming Story reply contains a question that cannot be covered by one template. Repli passes the interaction into the instructions saved with the rule and can generate a contextual answer. The quality depends on those instructions. A useful prompt describes the business, the facts the assistant may use, what it must not guess, the tone, and when it should ask a human to take over.
The two approaches can live side by side. One Story can use exact keywords with fixed answers while another uses AI for open questions. AI usage is charged against the account’s AI credit balance; it is not described as unlimited. If the answer involves inventory, price, policy or another changing fact, keep the source information current or use a deterministic link rather than asking AI to invent an answer.
Mentions are often social gestures, not purchase requests. Someone may be showing a delivery, sharing a visit, reposting a lesson or recommending the account. The first reply should respect that context. A short thank-you and a specific next question usually works better than dropping a catalogue link immediately. If every mention receives the same paragraph, the automation will be obvious for the wrong reason.
Write the message as the first line of a conversation. “Thanks for sharing this with us—may we ask what you liked most?” gives the person an easy way to continue. A creator might ask whether the follower wants the related worksheet. A venue might ask whether it may reshare the Story, but the business is responsible for obtaining any permission it needs; Repli does not turn a mention into automatic content rights.
Story mentions commonly arrive without text, so do not make a keyword mandatory for this trigger. Use a catch-all mention rule and let the response ask for context if needed. If the account receives very different kinds of mentions, keep the opening neutral and route the conversation after the person replies.
Repli uses Meta’s official Instagram messaging integration. It does not log in as a person, scrape the inbox, simulate taps, automatically watch other accounts’ Stories or create fake engagement. The connected account needs the permissions required for Instagram messaging, and those permissions can stop working if the account owner removes the app. Repli’s account connection status is the place to check when a previously working rule stops receiving events.
A Story interaction is not permission to send unrelated messages forever. Messaging remains subject to Meta’s policies and the permitted conversation window. Buttons and media are available only where the message format and platform endpoint support them. Delivery can also fail if Meta rejects an item, the account is disconnected or the user has exhausted an applicable Repli message allowance.
There is no separate “Story Automation” switch inside Meta that Repli pretends to control. Story replies arrive through incoming messages; Story mentions can arrive through messaging referrals or mention events. Repli subscribes to those real webhook fields while keeping the existing callback and verification architecture.
Use a second Instagram account that is not the connected business account. Publish a simple test Story with one keyword and reply from the second account. Check that the rule belongs to the right connected account, is active and contains the same word. Then confirm the DM arrives and the event appears in Repli’s message activity. Test each button and link on a phone rather than assuming it works because the text looks correct in the editor.
Test mentions separately. Tag the business from the second account’s Story and wait for Meta to deliver the event. A mention may not include message text, so the rule should be configured to answer every mention unless you know the event contains a matchable value. If no message arrives, confirm the connected account is still active and resubscribe its webhooks from the available account tools before rebuilding the rule.
Keep the first public launch small. Use the Story’s insights and the Repli logs to learn which wording people actually use, then add genuine variants. A failed send in the log is more useful than guessing: it tells the team whether the event arrived, which rule matched and whether Meta accepted the response.
Story automation works best at the top or middle of a conversation. The Story creates context, the viewer signals interest, and the DM removes friction from the next step. It can deliver a resource, answer a narrow question or start a lead form. It should not carry the full burden of qualification, support and closing in one message.
For ongoing keyword conversations in the inbox, the Instagram DM automation page explains the broader system. For engagement that begins below a post or Reel, comment-to-DM is the better trigger. For comments made during a broadcast, use the dedicated Instagram Live comment automation area because it adds public replies, per-minute controls and a Live event log that Story rules do not need.
Giving each interaction its own rule also makes reporting easier. The activity log records the Story trigger and automation rule, so the team can separate Story replies from mentions and from ordinary DMs. That is a cleaner basis for improving a campaign than combining every incoming message under one generic auto-responder.
In Repli, Instagram Story automation means sending a private response after someone replies to your Story or mentions your professional account in their own Story. It does not schedule Stories, auto-view Stories or create artificial engagement.
Yes. Connect an Instagram professional account, create a Story Reply rule, choose keywords or a broader match, and write the DM. Repli processes the incoming message through Meta’s official Instagram messaging integration.
Yes. Story Mention is a separate trigger. Because mention events often contain no useful text, you can use a catch-all rule that responds to every valid mention received for the connected account.
The shared Instagram automation builder supports DM buttons and image attachments where the selected message format and Meta endpoint allow them. Test the final flow on a real phone before promoting it.
Yes. A Story rule can use AI instructions to generate a contextual DM from the reply or mention. AI responses consume AI credits; fixed responses remain available when you want predictable copy without AI usage.
The integration is designed for an Instagram professional account connected through Meta with the required messaging permissions. A personal account does not provide the same business messaging webhook access.
Meta may deliver a Story mention without message text. Use a reply-to-all or catch-all Story Mention rule when every mention should receive the same opening response.
Repli uses Meta’s official messaging events and access tokens rather than browser automation or password sharing. You still need to follow Meta’s messaging rules, keep the account authorised and send only relevant responses to interactions people initiated.
Yes. Repli checks keyword conflicts within the relevant trigger type, so a Story keyword does not have to replace an unrelated comment or ordinary DM rule.
The dashboard treats both as Pro features. Check the pricing page for the current plan comparison; plan access is determined from Repli’s entitlement catalogue rather than a price typed into this page.
Pricing · All features · How it works · Blog