The Future Of Instagram

Instagram is a social network focused on uploading and processing images and videos, thanks to its retouching tools and filters.

It continues to be a trend in recent times.

This coolmedia has one billion monthly active users, who spend an average of 1 hour on the platform. Instagram is the social network with the most interactions after Facebook. Data that means that many companies (71% in the US) have a presence in it. And, according to a study, 83% of Instagram users discover new products or services thanks to the platform.

What will be Instagram in the coming months?

1. The profile of the “Instagrammer”

Although Instagram began as a simple application aimed at users, today it has become a profession for many and an opportunity for brands.

Do you know what it is to be an ” instagrammer ” ? These are profiles that earn money by producing and publishing photographs. But not any profile can live on Instagram, only profiles with millions of followers can do so.

By having such an audience, brands see in these people perfect showcases for, through collaborations, publicizing their products. And it is that the ” influencers ” or ” instagrammers ” are just opinion leaders on the Internet that emerged spontaneously.

These, together with the brands, media and communication agencies, are the protagonists of the new paradigm shift in the information and advertising sector .

That is why there are different types of influencers by sector:

• From fashion, among the most popular we find Dulceida, Laura Escanes or María Pombo.
• Makeup, one of the most profitable sectors of Influencer Marketing , such as Aishawari, Marikowskaya or Esbatt.
• Gamers, a class of influencer more popular among young people. Fooders, being the healthy food channels, are the most successful.
• Vloggers, who record their day to day. Fitness, sport and lifestyle experts. Finally travel, people who live almost idyllic experiences that make the public fall in love.

Also Read: 6 Trends For A Successful Instagram Strategy

2. The Instagram Story

Since October 2010, getting new followers or likes on our accounts brought us happiness and success, as there was a healthy competition with other users to see which accounts grew the fastest.

To this day, these two factors have become essential for account analysis and metrics for advertising campaign results .

So much so that there are companies that are dedicated to selling likes or followers. Therefore, every day, it is more complicated to work with reliable data.

3. Why will the likes disappear?

It is important to understand that a fundamental part of measuring engagement is precisely measuring likes .

In fact, taking engagement into account , influencers are also segmented, since not all brands can (or want to) contact Instagrammers with many followers:

• Micro: influencer who has between 5,000 and 25,000 followers and an engagement of 4%.
• Small influencer : between 25,000 and 100,000 followers and an engagement of 2.4%.
• Large: those who have between 250,000 and 1 million followers. In addition to an engagement of 1.8%.
• Macro Influencer: has between 1 and 7 million followers and an engagement of 1.6%.
• Celebrity: The account has more than 7 million followers and an engagement of 1.6% as well.

Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook and Instagram, said “we want users to focus on photos and videos, not how many likes they get.” It should be noted that the number of likes is beginning to become an obsession among users, since not everyone knows how to accept the fact that they do not grow as much as they would like.

Hiding likes will mean that we stop thinking in terms of popularity. Since only the owners of the images will actually be able to see the likes they have received.

After hearing this news, there are many who speak of a possible jump to a commercial dimension.

4. Instagram makes the leap to e-commerce

This social network already has an Instagram Shopping option .

It is a tool specially designed for all companies that use this social network. With it, stores can label their products in the photos they upload by adding the price.

This tool was born in the US and has gradually reached other European countries.

Not all companies can access this option, the characteristics that are requested are the following:

• Have the company profile configured.
• Sell ​​physical products on your official website.
• Integrate your catalog on Facebook using Shopify or BigCommerce.
• Have published a minimum of nine images.

After all this, a “Touch to see products” will appear at the bottom of the post.

From this option, Instagram wants to promote direct sales through this social network. So it will soon be available to both brands and users. Therefore, influencers will be able to tag the products they advertise.

Instagram is on the warpath against Google, which already competes directly with Google Shopping, and with Amazon, the online sales giant.

In conclusion, the like for like will stop working. We are facing a new re-dimension of the platform, and therefore, it is time for us to begin to see the new possibilities that Instagram has to offer us and apply them to our brands to continue being up to date.

Also Read: 4 Tips For Successful Instagram Marketing