3 Exciting Instagram Updates Coming this Autumn
#1 Instagram Alerts
Now Instagram is letting users know when their friends are online. The app wants to make it easier to connect with other users and represented brands by using a green dot to indicate and signify the online status. The function is similar to the one already used on Facebook. You will only see the immediate updates for users who actually follow your profile, or those who have previously connected with you. This function can be useful for the brands that use the Instagram direct messaging feature as their chosen communication channel. Sending messages to active users is far more efficient than reaching out to inactive accounts.
#2 Usage Insights
We’ve already mentioned this feature before in advance posts about Instagram tools, however at that point it wasn’t officially introduced to the market. The activity tool aims to help users control the amount of time they spend using the app. This new function can be found under “Settings” tab and it will show you on the graph how much time you’ve actually used within the app each day. This also allows you to set alerts if you’ve reached preset markers of 15 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours and so on, utilising the platform each day. The new function is simply to make users aware of how much time they spend and it won’t work like a platform-blocking extension. If the new option affects the time spent by users in the app, rethinking your Instagram strategy might be essential.
#3 Recommended Posts (in testing)
At the moment, the content you see in your Insta feed is either from a direct user or a hashtag you are following. This way Instagram feed is significantly different to Facebook’s and other social media’s. Here you can control what you really want to see (apart from the ads). This is due to change soon as Instagram is now testing a new feature that will display recommended posts. These will be based on the accounts that you follow and content that you have previously liked, with new posts coming from the accounts that you haven’t connected with in the past. This is a huge opportunity for brands to expand their reach utilising the app. We recommend implementing a structured strategy focused on boosting your engagement within your posts to fully maximise your visibility, whilst creating content that may appeal to a new audience.
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