So what can we expect? Well, it’s pretty simple. Using a drop-down menu at the top-left of your screen, you’ll be able to toggle between three different views:
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Home.
Ah, yes, Instagram as we know it. This is the current “discovery” experience, where the algorithm ranks posts based on what it thinks you most want to see.
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Favorites.
A subset of accounts you 100% don’t want to miss. Think: your besties, fam, and Oh Snap! Social. This view will be chronological – woo!
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Following.
A full list of everyone you’re following with their posts in chronological order for when you’ve got the time to scroll, scroll, scroll. (Did you know: most users don’t get through most of their follow list? Gulp.)
The changes are already being pushed across the app, and will be rolled out in full over the first half of 2022.
- Engagement matters. The home feed will become a content discovery engine –this means the cream-of-the-crop, high-engagement, poised-to-go-viral stuff, not holiday pics from your mom. Keep making killer, relevant content and encouraging your peeps to chime in, and you’ll be more likely to show up there.
- Be everyone’s favorite. Showing up is half the battle. Sure, you can do good work and hope to be added to those favorite feed lists…or you can ask. Use your CTA to ask people to follow you and add you to their favorites lists – so that you can be sure to show up in style on that more curated feed.
- Educate your followers! The home feed is going to stay the “default” feed. We’re all lazybones at heart, so that’s where most people are going to hang out, even with the new feed options (Facebook usage metrics show the same behavior). So make the effort to inform people about the changes to their feed and encourage and reward the behaviors we want to see.
Need some pointers on creating some amazing content that your followers will toggle through their feeds to see? Add me to your favorites, and I’ll show you how!