Well, it used to be pics of landscapes back in the day, didn’t it? But what works well on Instagram today?
It’s true that square pics of fashion, landscapes and pics of your dinner were ‘Gram staples when it was bought by Meta for a billion dollars in 2012. But the platform has evolved into a channel where the Meta portrait-shaped video format Reels now dominates.
A short while ago I went through public sector Facebook content to work out what had the best engagement. It surprised a few people. I thought I’d do the same for Instagram.
What good looks like
A yardstick of four per cent engagement is what Adobe says good looks like. So, if you have 100 followers on your channel then four interactions would be a sign that the content is working.
What content looks like
Instagram has long evolved away from being just pics. You can just post pictures but also, you can post a carousel of pictures which means multiple pictures in the same post for people to browse through. You can also post conventional video as well as Reels video.
In this piece of research I’ve also added artwork and toolkit as a format. Basically, toolkit content is that made by an organisation and then shared across a number of organisations with a request to share. An NHS Scotland Measles campaign shared with NHS organisations across the country would be an example of that. In addition, artwork is something designed in-house for a specific reason. Like a Happy Easter image, for example with a shot of an egg, text and a logo.
What the results show
Reels video is head and shoulders the most successful format of posting for the public sector, the survey showed. It’s not even close.
The engagement rate for Reels was a bumper 3.37 per cent well ahead of any other format.
The second most engaging format is a carousel of photographs at 1.3 per cent engagement with a standard single picture third at 0.82 engagement.
Artwork engaged 0.2 per cent and toolkit content connected with just 0.12 per cent.
What was potentially surprising was that conventional video performed particularly poorly. Just 0.03 per cent were engaging with this type of content. However, this option is being phased out.
Conclusions
The drive to Reels video is absolutely reflected in the numbers. While the Kardashians may not be happy at the drift to the video format the data doesn’t lie. The popularity of carousels isn’t surprising when you stop and think about it. Formats that mean people spend longer on the platform are almost always rewarded because time spent is such an important metric for social media companies.
About the survey
For the survey, 14 public sector channels and 135 posts were selected at random.
Content elected included NHS Highland, NHS Lothian, London Ambulance Service, Swansea University Health Board NHS, Belfast City Council, Manchester City Council, Lewisham Council, Essex County Council, Police Service Northern Ireland, Merseyside Police, Scottish Fire & Rescue and Devon & Somerset Fire & Rescue.
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