Gram Changer: How Instagram’s New Ad Format Will Revolutionise the Platform for Brands

It’s safe to say that influencer marketing as a concept is nothing new. Brands and businesses have been using public figures to endorse their products and services since 1760 when potters Josiah Wedgwood and Sons added royal stamps to their produce.What is new are the endorsers themselves, the types of brands they interact with, and how people interact with them. The social media age, and in particular the launch of Instagram in 2010, has accelerated the concept and evolution of influencer marketing unimaginably – transforming ‘influencer marketing’ to a $1 billion industry.To match this rapid transformation, social platforms have been forced to adapt to offer brands and users the best possible customer experience. It’s crucial that Instagram continues to evolve, and its latest update “branded content ads” is an important step to allow the next generation of pure-play digital and traditional businesses to thrive.Up until now, brands could only pay influencers to promote sponsored posts on their own feeds – crucially meaning that only the influencer’s followers would see the ad. Instagram’s new ad format will allow brands to post these ads more widely – including on the brand’s own official feed – and understand the impact.To those familiar with Facebook’s Branded Content feature – which also provides brands with insights into reach and engagement data and allows boosting of selected posts –this update will look and feel much like an extension of that.