Likes on Instagram have always been a means to gauge the success of your postings. Before business accounts, the only way to tell if your material was being seen at all was to tally the number of likes.
This metric may become obsolete in the near future. Instagram is experimenting with hiding the number of likes from everyone except the post’s creator. Instagram is putting this to the test in Canada.
During his keynote at the F8 developers conference, Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri announced the experiment.
“We want individuals to spend less time worrying about how many likes they get on Instagram and more time interacting with the people that matter to them.”
“There are no like counts when you navigate through your feed.” You can check who liked a photo or video by tapping through it, and if you have the time, you can add them all up yourself. The owner of the photo can see how many people liked it if they ask.”
Is this a positive or negative move? What are the advantages and disadvantages for companies and social media managers?
Advantages of Instagram Likes
It’s tempting to believe that corporations aren’t subjected to the same complaints as the general population. But don’t we, don’t we? We compare our achievements to those of others. In its most absurd form, this entails checking how many likes our competitors buy instagram likes cheap posts receive.
A short glance through Instagram reveals a lot of people passing judgment on Instagram posts with little likes or feeling self-conscious about their own like numbers.
However, in a world without public numbers, the pressure of chasing Instagram likes and the fear of being evaluated by others will be gone.
Is it only me who likes posts when I stroll through Instagram? A like is given to everyone in my feed.
It’s my method of indicating that I’ve seen the message. But aren’t those “likes” almost worthless? Even if I actually liked some of your postings, there’s no way of knowing whether I did it on purpose or out of habit.
It’s simple to like. Commenting, on the other hand, is not simple. Commenting needs mental effort. You must first formulate your comment, then type it with fat fingers, add emojis, double-check for mistakes, and finally post it.
The effort required to post a comment is far more engaging than a simple double tap of the finger.
Wouldn’t you agree that comments are a stronger indicator of Instagram success than likes?
Unless the comments is being done by a machine. Which leads me to…
Assassinate the bots
Instagram is at odds with software that automates the process. Bots that follow (and unfollow) accounts for you, bots that like articles for you, and bots that leave boring comments are all available.
Bots are prohibited on Instagram, but they continue to exist.
Instagram is reducing the value of bots by discounting the like count. Why would I pay to have Instagram likes sent to me automatically if the like count was no longer relevant?
Instagram, you’ve done a fantastic job.
Finding influencers is difficult when there are no more Instagram likes.
How can you tell if someone on Instagram is influential? Post likes are a good and simple location to start your search.
Likes are used by Instagram to help rank posts as “top posts” in hashtag feeds. Marketers utilize it in the same way they use engagement to find influencers.
We haven’t seen whether the lack of like counts on posts affects the top post algorithm, but even if it doesn’t, finding influencers will be considerably more difficult.
Vanity numbers aren’t going away anytime soon. We’ll have to rely on vanity data like follower count and follower ratio instead of Instagram likes.
Although comments have always been a stronger indicator of influence, they’re more difficult to spot with a flick of the finger.
Finding influencers is on my list of disadvantages, but I don’t believe that working harder to locate influencers is necessarily a bad thing. Perhaps the extra effort will pay off, and we’ll discover excellent content creators we previously neglected.
It’s easy to dismiss likes as unimportant, yet they do. How much do you trust a brand whose postings aren’t getting any likes or comments?
A brand with a huge number of followers but no Instagram likes may indicate that followers were obtained unethically.
We look to others for cues on how to act both online and offline. We’re more likely to like an Instagram post if we see a lot of people liking it. Social proof is the term for this occurrence. It may be unpleasant, but it is a fact of internet marketing.
There are more bots now.
If removing likes eliminates like bots, it may also encourage the creation of additional comment bots. If this is implemented, will we witness an increase in bogus and inappropriate comments on our posts?
Only time will tell if this is true.
What Should Companies Do?
We don’t know if the experiment of masking Instagram Likes will be successful. But how should businesses and social media managers react if it is implemented?
1. Concentrate on making connections.
Start some talks if you notice that they are becoming more significant. Find ways to elicit a response from your audience with your material, whether through visuals or the opening few lines of your captions.
Set aside time each day to respond to comments and engage in discussions on postings from your followers and others who influence them. You’ll encourage others to write comments on your posts if you’re active.
2. Post as if no one is looking.
Finally, you can stop worrying about what other people think of your like counts and focus on creating and consuming content that will resonate with our consumers.
3. Take a look at your likes.
Just because no one else is interested in what you like doesn’t mean you shouldn’t. Identify your most popular posts and try to figure out why they were so popular.
You can keep track of your likes/saves, comments, and overall involvement with Agorapulse. So you’re not only depending on likes, but you’re also figuring out how to start initiating conversations and getting actual engagement from your followers.