Influencers, social media managers, marketing experts: anyone who works with social media, and in particular with Instagramworships only one deity: the algorithm. That system that can make or break entire marketing campaigns. Understanding its general functioning is not complex (the algorithm rewards any form of interaction), but knowing the specific details yes, since social platforms are always very elusive in providing details.
But lately Instagram is revealing more and more. Of course, this is sip information, but it is pure gold for insiders. In a post on its blog (via The Verge), just recently, Meta’s photographic social network explained that the algorithm thinks differently depending on the feed concerned.
Let’s try to understand specifically what it means.
Instagram doesn’t have just one algorithm, it has at least three
In the post, Instagram explains that the content rating system is divided into four sections: Feeds, Stories, Explore and Reels. These are, in fact, the four main sections of the app. This information, which may seem trivial, is actually very important: the algorithm evaluates the contents of the four sections differently.
The Stories, for example, are classified according to the frequency with which a user sees updates to an account and interactions with the same (so DMs and story likes also count). Not only. Instagram also tries to evaluate the relationship between the two accounts: if he senses that a user is your relative, partner or close friend, he will tend to show it to you more than an influencer.
I Reels, on the contrary, they don’t reward so much the real relationship between users but pure social interactions. Nothing new under the sun: likes, shares, comments and saves assign a positive score to the contents, which are thus shown to more users. Even on this section, however, Instagram reveals one more detail: watching the Reel to the end and/or clicking on the audio track of the Reel increases the score assigned by the algorithm.
How the “Algorithm” Works 📝
– “The Algorithm” (or actually algorithms)
– Ranking Stories
– Ranking Feed
– Ranking Reels
– Ranking Explore
– “Shadowbanning”
– How to Grow Your AudienceMore details here: https://t.co/AzFTwRCp6e pic.twitter.com/ZUJDT37aaD
— Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) May 31, 2023
Although the post doesn’t go into the details of the sections Feed (the home) ed ExploreInstagram lets us guess that the use of buttons “Show more” e “show less” affects the overall score. Not only therefore for the single user, but for the total relevance that the algorithm assigns to the content.