Instagram chief Adam Mosseri says the app is no longer a photo-sharing platform and has detailed some of the upcoming changes that are in the pipeline. The admission — or assertion — is not surprising at all. Over the past few quarters, Instagram has laid a considerable amount of emphasis on the shopping and video aspects, especially as the rivalry with TikTok and Snapchat heats up. Late last year, Instagram introduced Reels, its own take on a TikTok-style feed of virtual videos.
However, that was not the end of it. Instagram quickly borrowed a few other ideas, such as Save Audio, Share Audio Pages, and Audio Browser, to make Reels more compelling. A few weeks later, the Duet feature from TikTok was imitated by Instagram under a new name - Remix. To make the feature more appealing, the Facebook-owned company is even considering a ‘Bonus’ payment to Reel creators. Needless to say, the increasing shift towards becoming a video-first platform with a healthy dose of shopping tricks is the core growth mantra right now.
The Instagram CEO highlighted just that in a video posted to Twitter - except the part about blatantly copying and repackaging TikTok tricks. Mosseri notes that going forward. Instagram is going to focus on four key areas -- creators, video, shopping, and messaging to help people connect with friends more easily. On video, the Instagram co-founder says there is an immense amount of growth potential here, and in the coming months, that’s what the company is going to lean more into.
Instagram Aims To Focus On Video, Shopping, Creators & Messaging
Coming to the changes, Instagram will push videos in the feed from accounts that users may not even follow. On the surface, this might sound like a move that adds to the unnecessary clutter, but it might emerge as a popular way of discovering entertaining content and new creators. Instagram actually appears to be banking more on the latter aspect. Citing research, Mosseri claims that the primary reason people now come to Instagram is to get entertained, and that is where video proves to be a potent tool. Moreover, Instagram will also begin testing video topics, letting users specify what type of videos they would like to see more often in their feed. How that remains distinct from the Reels experience is something that the folks over at Instagram will have to figure out, but users who still perceive Instagram as a platform where they can share memories probably won’t be particularly excited about the video-first overhaul to their feed.
As for the types of videos, Mosseri says the company is targeting “full-screen, immersive, entertaining, and mobile-first” content. The Instagram head mentions that TikTok and YouTube are key rivals right now in its video ambitions. In particular, the latter has tasted some sweet success lately with its YouTube Shorts, while TikTok is now heavily focusing on influencer-driven commerce. Instagram, too, is going to double down on the shopping experience and monetization tools for creators with a ton of new features. Aside from offering a dedicated Shop section, Instagram is exploring more monetization opportunities for creators, such as Exclusive Stories. In addition, the company is going to rely heavily on some breakthrough innovations that Facebook is currently working on, including Visual Search.
Yes, photo-sharing is still at the heart of Instagram, but the app has evolved into something a lot more dynamic and diverse. From a bubbling creator ecosystem and an expansive shopping experience to hosting a social video-sharing universe of its own, Instagram is no longer solely a photo-sharing app. How that evolution is accepted by its audience of roughly one billion users is an altogether different debate.
Source: Adam Mosseri/Twitter