IGTV: How to Take Advantage of Instagram’s Bold New Format
When Instagram launched Instagram TV, better known as IGTV, as part of the celebrations marking the social media giant reaching the one billion user milestone, experts started to speculate it was a clear challenge on YouTube’s apparent domination of matters video. It was announced that the IGTV feature will not only be available as an additional icon at the top right of the screen on the traditional Instagram app, but it will also be available as a standalone app on its own merit. This article will look to shine a spotlight on how the new IGTV works and how one can take advantage of the new frontier likely to be opened up by its entry into the market.
It doesn’t differ that much from YouTube in its inner workings in that it also grants its users access to different channels from which they can stream long-form content. This means that those following influencers or any celebrity big on social media should expect to see their IGTV channels to be full of longer videos as they start using the feature. You will also realize that as soon as you open the app, IGTV starts playing with videos being as lengthy as one hour. Changing the channel is also quite easy as all you have to do is simply swipe up. There is the option of searching for a particular channel or browsing popular content or those posted by users that you follow. The workings of liking and sharing content remain the same as in the traditional Instagram app.
Now that we are a little bit conversant with the workings of the new IGTV, let us look into how its introduction is set to affect the Instagram brand. With big risks usually comes big reward and this move by Instagram is being projected by experts to be one that in the long run will have a great return on their investment. With this one move Instagram is not only taking on YouTube but also long-time rival Snapchat. Experts are projecting that IGTV will boost Instagram’s revenue up to about $5.5 billion in the U.S on ad revenue alone this year.
To the important matter on how all this is likely to benefit advertisers and digging through everything we know IGTV, there is no initial avenue or infrastructure that is in place at the moment that would allow advertisers to monetize IGTV. The good news is that there is no doubt whatsoever that ads will be invading IGTV very soon as the only reason they are not there yet is that it is basically in its infant stage in the market but experts see ads going there as a logical next step. Experts are speculating that one of the reasons why ads are not on IGTV yet is that Instagram are waiting to see just how much content goes through the platform. This will then decide whether they’d need their own advertising UI if the content through it is as high as expected or if they don’t if the content doesn’t reach a certain set threshold. When ads do come to IGTV, you can expect influencers with large amounts of followings to have a very strong relationship with brands.
Speaking of brands, the introduction of IGTV and how it does is one they will be closely monitoring in the coming weeks and months. As things stand, most brands worth their salt were already on Instagram making use of Instagram stories and other features but IGTV is a clear upgrade on this. This is because it provides an avenue for brands to repost or repackage videos that had been made for Facebook and YouTube and get them into an entirely new audience, a big one given how popular Instagram is. Creating a unique channel for your brand is also really easy as it happens automatically happens when you upload your first IGTV video. Good news for marketers is that the swipe-up call-to-action feature that was available with Instagram stories is also available on IGTV. This therefore means that you can still link to target landing pages as well as upload IGTV videos straight to Facebook and watch them.
Another good thing about IGTV for brands is that as any Instagram video, nobody expects their videos to be perfect and consumers will consume anything as long as it grips them or piques their interest. In any case user-generated, unpolished content is what Instagram is all about so brands don’t necessarily have to jump through hoops to generate perfect content. What is definitely for certain is that IGTV is the next big thing for marketers out there and that getting in on the action early and getting to know the do’s and don’ts is the recommended thing to do as we all await the expected pronouncement on the addition of ad space on IGTV. For more on this and much more runrex.com is the place to visit.