This September we’ve had some key metric changes to Instagram, including a major new way of measuring engagement, an update to reels captions and improvements to getting your content to reach non followers.
Broadcast channel updates
New personalisation features have been added to broadcast channels. You can now add a background, personalised emoji curation (select which ones are allowed and not), and finally you can now go live exclusively for your channel members. Got a special offer you want to share with loyal customers? A product back in stock? This is a great way to connect with customers.
Boost updates
You can now boost directly from Instagram.com and avoid those Apple service fees! This can be done from a computer or mobile browser.
Polls on Reels
When posting a reel on Instagram you can now add a poll into your caption! This is an active way non followers can interact with your reel when it appears in their explore feed. The only catch is reels with polls cannot be scheduled.
Trial mode
Trial mode is a new switch you can turn on for your next Instagram post. When trial mode is turned on your content is only shown to a pool of non followers, a fantastic new feature to see how your content does in the big wide world with no followers support! With trial mode you can adjust the settings to enable your content to go live to your followers if it performs well with a non follower audience in the first 48 hours, it’s a win win!
Views as a new metric
Views as a new metric are soon to be rolled out on Instagram. Views will measure all metrics even on stills, as soon as content is viewed the number goes up and unlike the current metric a view will count every time an account pauses on your content or replays it for any given time.
