← Build Your Tribe | Grow Your Business with Social Media
Build Your Tribe | Grow Your Business with Social Media
9 NEW Instagram Features That *Actually* Help You Grow - 857
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The Instagram news cycle is seemingly never ending with a constant flood of new features, algorithm updates, and app changes. And so today, I'm going to share with you nine new Instagram changes that are going to actually make a difference for you if you're trying to grow your brand, your business, get more views or more followers on Instagram. Number one, let's hop right into this with some not so great news, and that is that Instagram has removed the Share to Facebook option. And because of that, many users are reporting significant drops in their views. Essentially, this change was done a little bit in secret. Instagram hasn't made a formal announcement, but most people are now reporting that their ability to automatically post their reels to Facebook has disappeared. In addition to this change, not only is Instagram no longer allowing creators to automatically share their reels to Facebook, but they are no longer combining the views across both platforms. Essentially, for the last few months, many users have seen their total reel views not just be reflected on the number of views that they're getting on Instagram, but also the number of views that they're getting on Facebook. Now, of course, you can still share your reels to Facebook. You just can't do it automatically. You can't do it in a way that it's connected to your Instagram, and Instagram will not show you the number of views from both platforms. Essentially, you'll have to download or save your reel prior to posting it on Instagram and and then upload it separately to Facebook in order to get those views on Facebook. But again, this is a pretty big change that has affected a lot of creators, and we haven't had any official announcement from Meta in regards to this change. This is something that's worth checking into because it's very possible that you were getting a large chunk of views from Facebook and you're no longer getting those views. All that you can do, and all that I would recommend doing is downloading your reels like I already mentioned, and posting them separately to Facebook. The second update is the biggest update of all, and this is going to be one of the biggest changes to the app maybe that we've ever seen. Definitely the biggest change that we've seen in the last five to 10 years, and that is a complete app redesign. Now, this feature, just like most of the features I'm going to list today, are still being rolled out. So Instagram can't just flip a switch and then suddenly all 3 billion active users get all the same features at the same time. I remember back a few Years ago, when reels first came out, that, that it took over a year and a half for every user to get access to reels, which, when you think about how central and how important reels are to the platform, keep that in mind when you're thinking about these maybe less important features. But the one I'm talking about right now is not less important. It is massive. And it is going to be rolled out worldwide over the next few months. And that is a redesign of how the app looks. Now, I mentioned this a few weeks ago. I told you it would be coming soon. So, by the way, if you haven't already subscribed, make sure that you stay subscribed to the podcast. A lot of y' all are listening every week, but you don't even realize you're not subscribed. So make sure that you're subscribed so that in the future, when I do tell you, hey, coming soon, there's a new feature update. You actually get that episode in your app so you can watch it, listen, and know about this update before it's actually coming to fruition, before it actually hits. But it has hit now and it has been officially announced and it is being rolled out and, and essentially the new app layout is going to look like this. In the upper left hand corner, there's now going to be a plus button, and that is going to be the Create post button. When you click that button, it's going to take you to the Instagram Stories camera, which is where you can create an Instagram story. You can also create a reel, go live, or create a post from this page. At the top center will be the Instagram logo with a little dropdown arrow to the right of it. That dropdown arrow will allow you to filter through the three different feeds that Instagram offers, which is is actually a feature that no one really uses yet. It's something that everyone asks for almost every single time Adam Mozeri, the head of Instagram, makes a post. People say, we want the chronological feed. Well, you've actually had the option to switch into a chronological feed for the last three years. Back in 2022, Instagram gave us the option to switch to a chronological feed whenever we want. So now when you see that Instagram logo and the little down arrow to the right of it, tapping on that down arrow will give you three options. It will give you the main home feed, which is what we're used to seeing. On the main home feed, you get a collection of recommended posts from people you don't follow Ads from advertisers and posts from the people you actually do follow. You'll also have the option to view a Favorites feed, which is, you guessed it, a feed with just the people who you have added to the favorites. But there is an algorithm operating in that feed, because if you've added, let's say, 17 different creators to your list of favorites, and there is still going to be an algorithm to decide which favorite is your most favorite and which posts you should actually see first. And then the third and final option is a feed called Following. The following feed is a chronological feed with only people you follow. When you click on that feed for the very first time, if you've never experienced it, you're going to be thrown off a little bit, especially if you're someone like most of us who follows hundreds or thousands of people on Instagram, because you're going to see a bunch of posts from people who you're like, wait, wait, I haven't seen them in years. Wait, I didn't even realize I followed this person. And honestly, it might be a little bit jarring at first, but hey, if you want to swap into a chronological feed, you can do that at any time using that feature. Going back to the new app layout, though, in the upper right hand corner, where we used to see notifications and direct messages, you will now only see notifications. So there will be a little heart in the upper right hand corner. And when you tap on that, you'll be able to view a summary of all of the recent likes, comments and other engagements that your posts have received. Then below the top menu bar will be the Instagram stories, and this has been unchanged. Your story will still appear in the first position in the upper left, and then all subsequent stories will appear after that in a scrollable horizontal feed. And so again, that's the Home tab. It's in what's called the first position, the bottom right button. The second position, one button to the right, which is currently the Explore page, is now going to be changed to the Reels tab. The Reels tab, as confusing as this may sound, is not only for reels, it's primarily for reels, but it's also for carousels, where music has been added. So, pro tip, if you're ever going to post a carousel on Instagram, make sure that you add music so that it has eligibility to show up on the Reels tab. And I know that's super confusing, but since reels are one of the primary drivers of Instagram's growth, that's why they are moving reels to be in the new second position. Another driver of Instagram's growth is direct messages. And so direct messages are now going to be in the third position, basically the bottom center button, the button that is currently the plus sign, in order to create a new post that's now going to be DMs one to the right of that in the fourth position, is currently the Reels tab, and it is now going to be changed to be the Explore page. So basically, the Explore page has moved from the second position over over to the fourth position. And the Explore page, from our understanding, is not going to look any different than it currently does. And then, last but not least, the fifth and final position in the bottom right is and will still be your Profile tab. Besides all of those visual changes, Instagram is seeking to make it easier to swap between each tab. So right now, currently you have to tap on each tab to switch. But with these new changes, Instagram is going to allow us to swipe left and right to to swap between the different pages. So if I'm on the home feed, the bottom left button, and I want to get to my profile, I can still tap on the bottom right button and swap over to my profile, or I can swipe to the right, thus swiping through the reels page, the DMs, the new Explorer page, and then to my profile. Basically, they're trying to make it a more seamless experience so that there's less tapping and more swiping. Now, this new layout, when it first gets rolled out, when you first get access to it, it's probably going to be confusing, it's probably going to be overwhelming. That's what most people are reporting. But from my conversations with a lot of my followers on Instagram, it seems like after the first few days, it actually becomes more intuitive and easier to use. So hopefully that's the case for you. Now, of course, an app redesign that's affecting all of us is probably not going to affect views or engagement in any way, positively or negatively, because we're all experiencing the same change. And it's not a change to the algorithms or really a change to the platform and how it operates. It's just a change to the buttons we press and where the buttons are located. But with all that said, moving on now, the third new Instagram update is an update to Instagram Stories with a brand new feature called AI ReStyle. Essentially, from now on, anytime you take a photo with your Instagram Stories, there is going to be a little paintbrush with a sparkle icon in the upper right hand corner. And when you tap on that, you can use Meta AI to restyle your image. Basically, you can do a total image redesign. You can change your outfit, you could add a top hat, you could add sparkles, you could add a disco ball. There are a lot of different capabilities, but in all honesty, playing around with it, it's not any different than using ChatGPT's image generator or really any other AI based image generator. The only difference, of course, is that it's baked into Instagram and so you don't have to have a separate app, you don't have to go to these different AI subscription services. You can just use it right in Instagram, take your photo on Instagram Stories and make little edits that way. I don't think it's something that is necessarily going to revolutionize your views. I don't think Instagram is going to give preferential treatment to Instagram Stories using this AI restyle feature. Although with that being said, of course I will test and look into it and I will report back on what I find. But my assumption is this is just a little feature that Instagram is giving us to kind of blur the lines between the metaverse and and Instagram itself and make it easier for us to start using the little AI features that Meta AI is creating. The next Instagram update might be the biggest flipping update of all. And of course, in good old Instagram fashion, it's a new feature that we can use on Instagram that isn't actually provided by Instagram. This new feature will allow you to automatically and instantly send a direct message to anyone when they follow you. So the second a new person follows your account, they can receive an automatic and instantaneous message from you saying whatever it is that you want it to say. There have been some sketchy online tools that have provided this feature for the last few years, but they're sketchy and they were never approved by Instagram. And I do know a lot of creators manually send messages to their new followers, welcoming them to their page, asking a question and just introducing themselves in the DMs. But now we have an officially approved by Instagram approved by Meta way to instantly and automatically DM our new followers. Of course, this is only available through ManyChat. ManyChat is a platform that I've been using for over five years. I've been partnered with for the last three or four years. I did an entire episode a few weeks ago breaking down the benefits of using it on your stories. And your feed posts. But this is a new feature that is exclusively available through manychat and, and I think it's going to be very, very helpful. Now, word to the wise, word of caution. I think a lot of people are going to use this to try to make a quick sale. But the reality is when someone follows you is not the instance that they're going to buy from you, they're going to buy down the line. Once they trust you, once they know you, once they really like your stuff and they keep seeing you in the feed over and over again. So if when someone follows you, you instantly send them a message, that's like trying to make a sale, trying to ask them about their weight loss journey just so you can sell your weight loss supplements, that's going to get you a lot of unfollows and not a lot of customers. Instead, when you do get a new follower, if you are going to be using this new automation from ManyChat, I would highly suggest using it just as an opportunity to send a quick thank you. Hey, thanks so much for following. I really appreciate it. Hey, I appreciate you following me. I post every single day about rock climbing tips and don't forget to check out my broadcast channel for helpful alerts. Things like that that are just easy, they don't cost anything, they're not even a freebie or like a digital download or a way to get people on your email list. It's just purely an act of gratitude, a way to thank them for following and introduce yourself. It begins that conversation. Think of it like this. If you're a single looking to date and you're out at a coffee shop and you make eye contact with a cutie, you, you don't walk over and then get on one knee with the engagement ring, you maybe smile or wave or maybe you make eye contact a few more times and then you go over and you introduce yourself and you say, hi, nice to meet you, I'm such and such. But you don't launch right into the wedding, you don't launch right into the engagement, you don't launch right into the sale. So just start simple, start easy, introduce yourself, express some gratitude, and that's all you need to do. But with that being said, I do think that this feature is going to be a game changer and it's going to be so, so helpful. So for the average Instagram user, because when someone follows you, it might not be when they're most likely to become a customer, but it is the peak of their engagement cycle. The moment that someone follows you is usually the peak of when they are most engaged, most attentive to and most interested in your account. And so being able to direct message them at that moment and just start the conversation, it can create a cycle of engagement so that they that peak doesn't immediately fall off a cliff. The fifth new Instagram feature that you need to be aware of is one that is currently in testing, or at least it's reportedly in testing. And there's some conflicting information out about this feature because numerous Instagram beta testers have reported that they have gotten access to this feature, which shows that it is quite literally in testing. And yet on his Instagram stories, Adam Mozeri said, no, we're never really going to make a feature like that. We have no plans to make a feature like that. And, and so there's some conflicting information out there. Maybe he just doesn't know that they're working on it. Maybe they were working on it, but then they decided to scrap it. And so he's giving us the updated information. I'm not sure. So I'm just going to tell you the information so that you're aware of it. And I'm sorry for leading you on for the last minute, but the new feature that I'm referring to is the ability to schedule Instagram stories right in the app. Now, most third party scheduling tools already allow you to schedule stories. I schedule all of my feed posts, my reels and my carousels on Metricool. And if I wanted to, I could also schedule my stories on Metricool. Now I don't, because I'm in agreement with Adam Mosseri that the purpose of Instagram stories is not to pre plan, to curate, to edit in advance and create for your Instagram stories. Instagram stories are supposed to be about documentation over creation or over curation. But with that being said, I can absolutely think of numerous examples of how scheduling an Instagram story would actually be very helpful. For example, if I'm doing a brand deal and I know the brand needs me to post at 11am on a specific day, well, I have to get that story approved in advance, which means that it's created in advance. So I might as well schedule it in advance so that I don't have to also worry about posting it on that day. I can also imagine a small business owner who knows that they have an upcoming sale or an upcoming launch. And so instead of having to remember to to post your stories at the exact moment on that day, you could schedule them. You could even schedule them another Example of this is if you had a sale that let's say ends at midnight. Well, if stories are up for 24 hours, well then theoretically you would want the story to be Posted at like 12:01 or 11:59 the night before so that it's up for the full day of the sale. But there's no bleed over period, right? There's not like a four hour period because you posted at 4am so then from midnight to 4am the sale has ended, but the story is still up. Or maybe you post it the night before before you went to bed. You posted it at 10pm so now the story expires at 10pm and there's two hours left where the sale is still ongoing. But you have no story. Right? If you can only have a story up for 24 hours, it would be advantageous if we could schedule the story to post right at midnight. That way we don't have to stay awake and manually post it at midnight, but we could capitalize and take advantage of the full 24 hours of the story sale by having a story up. So even though I don't think necessarily the majority of users, the majority of Instagrammers will use scheduled stories, I think for us small business owners and creators, it would be advantageous to at least have this feature. And so despite what Adam Mozeri says, they appear to be working on creating this for us. New Instagram update number six is the ability to automatically translate and dub your reels between English, Spanish, Hindi and Portuguese. English. Now this was originally rolled out a few months ago and it was just between English and Spanish. But now they have also added Hindi and Portuguese because those four languages are the four most common languages on Instagram. Now this is a feature that I absolutely think will help you get more views, especially if you have the capacity for a worldwide audience. If you have a nail salon that can only get customers within your local city, well then it doesn't really make sense to translate your reels into a language that most people in your city don't speak. I understand that. But for those of us who are trying to reach a worldwide audience, for those of us who are trying to get more views, go viral and reach more people, this is going to be very helpful. Every time I talk about this feature, it gets not great engagement. Every time I post about this feature, people don't seem that interested in it. And I think it's a real missed opportunity because not only will your reels be automatically translated, but Instagram is using AI to voice dub them. So that it's your voice speaking a different language, which is pretty trippy the first time you hear it. And they're even offering AI lip dubbing so that your lips aren't speaking English, but the words coming out are in Spanish. It will actually use AI to edit your video ever so slightly, just over your mouth, so that it looks like you are speaking Spanish and the audio is in Spanish and it's your voice speaking Spanish. It's pretty flipping cool. It's pretty crazy. All you have to do to use this feature is just turn on the toggle. But before you press post, Instagram update number seven is yet another update that Instagram is testing and has not been officially announced or rolled out yet, but that is adding more images or the option to add more images to your carousels. Now, for the first decade or so that carousels existed, you could only Post up to 10 photos and videos in your carousels, the slideshow posts. But then in 2024, they gave us the ability to add up to 20 images or videos in our carousels. But recently, Adam Mosseri himself posted a carousel that had 24 different slides. This was a first of its kind. We've never seen a carousel before that had more than 20 carousels. And now some people have started to notice the ability to post more than 20 slides in their carousels. So again, not official, still in testing, but very soon we might be able to post more than 20 slides in our carousels, which is pretty crazy. By the way, speaking of carousels, just last week I did a video that had eight creative Instagram carousel ideas. It was an update of an earlier video that I did from this year with eight other Instagram carousel ideas. So definitely check those out. And between the two videos, you'll have 16 creative trending viral Instagram carousel ideas. Instagram update number eight is another feature that Instagram is working on, and this one is going to be super helpful. This feature is going to give you the ability to share your reel to your story. But when you do, you can select an exact moment within your reel that the story will begin playing. Currently, how it works on Instagram is that when you share your reel to your story, it it automatically just starts playing from the very beginning of the reel, which in many cases will be what you want, because that's where your hook is. And the video might not make sense from the middle, but let's imagine that in your reel, you are telling a very dramatic story. And so when you share that reel to your Instagram story, you don't want it to start at the beginning. You want it to start, like, right at the climax, right at the most dramatic part, so that the people who are watching your stories are like, what is it? I need to watch the full reel to get the full story. Of course, that's just one idea. I'm sure there are plenty of other creative ways and reasons why you might want to start your reel at a specific moment when you share it to your story. So that is something that Instagram is testing and currently working on. And I do think it's going to be a very useful tool for increasing engagement on our reels and getting people from our Instagram stories into the actual reel itself. And then finally, last but not least, maybe the most helpful feature that Instagram could come out with is one that they are currently testing, and that is the ability to add clickable links to our reels. Yes, for the first time ever, Instagram is working on giving us the option to put a URL in our caption and add it to the reel, or as a clickable little button that will appear at the very, very bottom of the reel. This is something that Instagram has never done before. And for the history of Instagram, for the over 15 years that Instagram has been Instagram, when you put a link on your post, in your reel, on the caption, it's not clickable. And so it sucks. And so don't do it. It's a waste of time, energy, and effort because no one's going to be able to click it. And there's no chance someone's going to, like, take a screenshot of it and then write down what it was, then go to their browser and type it in. It's just not going to happen. And so with this new feature that Instagram is testing, it could be easier than ever before to distribute links, get people to go to our landing page, go to our YouTube, whatever it may be, by adding clickable links to our reels. We'll see it's still in testing. And of course, I will update you here on the Build you'd Tribe podcast as soon as it does come out, if it ever does actually get rolled out worldwide. Thank you so much for listening today. And as always, happy networking.
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