Have you noticed how Instagram looks really different? Here’s a run through of the main updates and how your brand can stay relevant at the time of Instagram updates and platform reinvention!
1-Vertical not Square!
Instagram may have originated as a photo sharing app but it is briskly moving towards a new form of media, short-form videos. With the recent launch of Instagram reels, short videos have been upfront and center on the app, with video creators getting boosted to a whole new market of audiences than ever before. Paired with the additional feature of transforming Instagram’s user interface to a vertical layout and incorporating music into static posts as well (for a select group of test users so far), we need to recognise that Instagram is learning from their biggest competitor TikTok and making great strides to meet the demand for video content. In fact, according to the Head of instagram, Adam Mosseri’s, the future of photos and videos will be “mobile-first”, so go ahead and get shooting (vertically) on your phones!
2-Create Reels from Highlights!
With Reels reigning over the Explore page, Instagram is making it easier than ever for you to create your own short form video content. Open your highlights and click on the 3 dots at the bottom right of the page, indicating more. Tap on the “Convert into a Reel” option to easily and efficiently create a Reel for your Instagram account!
Choose the audio (pick ones that’s trending!) and re-adjust the clips as you desire to create your Reel, it couldn’t be simpler! This is an easy and efficient way to start posting short-form video content on your Instagram page.
3-Filter your Feed!
Here’s a new hack that you can use to filter through your home page (the page where you can view the stories of who you follow)! Tap on the Instagram logo at the top of the page and you’ll see 2 drop down options pop up, namely “Following” and “Favorites”. With this new added feature, Instagram users can choose “favorites” amongst the people they follow and browse through their posts exclusively, rather than all the posts of their following that would normally pop up on their homepage. So here’s the trick, if your brand account makes it on their “Favorites” tab, your content is very likely to have a much higher engagement rate!
4-Steal, never copy!
Instagrammers love original content. No matter how bizarre, if they’ve never seen it before, there’s a good chance they’ll buzz about it. And if we can take any advice from one of the greatest creatives, Pablo Picasso once said, “Good artists copy, Great artists steal”. Re-align your brand’s efforts to curate original content instead of reposting other accounts. This could be creating your own versions of trends or even re-imagining popular trending content to fit your niche. Take inspiration from viral Instagram content, but don’t forget to make it your own! Still unsure of what that entails? Read our next article ”Optimizing your Instagram in 2022!” to find out how brands can do that and grow tenfold on Instagram!
5-Ration your Stories!!
To declutter and redesign their user interface, Instagram is beta-testing their newest feature to a small group of users now . The new update limits the number of stories shown to a person’s followers. Though an account may post up to a 100 stories per day, Instagram now has a pop-up notification that will ask the follower if they want to continue viewing the stories after the first 3 stories have been watched. If not, they can simply skip to viewing the stories of the next content creator they follow.
This feature is integral to know for brands, as this shows us that brand accounts must fully optimize the initial stories they post as those will have the highest view count. Furthermore, if posting multiple stories per day, brands need to recognise the importance of scheduling the stories in different times of the day, so that the 24 hour window of a story will provide some leeway for a follower to view their stories as part of a new day.
In conclusion,
While Instagram is upgrading tenfold, brands can have a hard time keeping track of these trends and figuring out how to garner more traffic to their businesses. We at Tokotown Pro specialize in bringing influencer marketing to localized, homegrown businesses in Singapore. When you sign up with Tokotown Pro, you can engage popular local influencers to promote your business to their thousands of Singaporean followers. Create a conversation about your brand and boost your brand recognition in Singapore with our team! Download the Tokotown Pro app to get started and BOOK A DEMO when you want to try us out!