Roxane BERNARD – 11/09/2019
Starting next week, Instagram will test some accounts in the US and hide their likes in an attempt to decide wether or not this is a solution to a safer, healthier environment.
This “hide and don’t seek” strategy has been tested in other countries and other platforms like Facebook and YouTube. Chief of Instagram, Adam Mosseri announced on Wired: “We will make decisions that hurt the business if they help people’s well-being and health,…”
“Starting next week, if you live in the US you might discover that the all-important number that tells the world how many likes your Instagram post received has disappeared.” Business Insider
The goal: becoming a real sharing tool with genuine content instead of posts only meant to attract engagement, sometimes leading to shocking or fake “news”.
But how will this affect influencers, marketers and their clients?
It seems this will be applied to random types of profiles, which includes influencers.
For marketers, relevant content, influencers who help in an organic fashion, and campaigns, are key to spread the word.
As marketing goes, this can have an impact on your brands. Tests in other countries like Australia, Brazil, and Italy among others, have shown to affect negatively the reach of their content.
As a marketer, I believe there are other ways to reach out to the right audience than the widespread popularity contest.
Keeping an open mind is key.
While a transition period, if this change was to be pursued, may have some negative impact at first, in the long run, good marketing should still be able to reach its targeted audiences.
To succeed, our marketing creativity would be put to the test, exploring a new environment, and coming up with new ways to reach our goals… A great marketing challenge.
Roxane BERNARD.
Sources: https://www.wired.com/story/instagram-hiding-likes-adam-mosseri-tracee-ellis-ross-wired25/
https://www.businessinsider.com/instagram-to-test-hiding-like-counts-in-us-wired25-2019-11
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