Ep 54. Instagram Trial Reels: Everything you need to know about the new update - Call Her Creator with Katelyn Rhoades

Summary

Call Her Creator with Katelyn Rhoades Episode 54: Instagram Trial Reels – Everything You Need to Know About the New Update Release Date: January 22, 2025

Introduction to Trial Reels

In Episode 54 of Call Her Creator, host Katelyn Rhoades delves into the newly introduced Instagram feature: Trial Reels. Recognizing the buzz surrounding this update, Katelyn aims to demystify how Trial Reels operate, their potential benefits for creators, and practical steps to effectively integrate them into your social media strategy.

Katelyn opens the episode with enthusiasm:

"If you've ever felt nervous about sharing a reel, Instagram is helping all of us little nervous nellies with trial reels." ([00:00])

What Are Trial Reels?

Trial Reels are Instagram’s latest feature designed to allow creators to experiment with content before it reaches their entire follower base. Think of them as a "soft launch" for new ideas, enabling creators to gauge the reception of their content among non-followers without the fear of immediate backlash or poor engagement metrics.

Katelyn explains:

"Trial reels allow creators to post experimental content that only non followers will see. So if the reel performs really well, you could decide if you want to show it to your followers or keep it hidden." ([00:00])

Benefits of Trial Reels

Katelyn outlines three primary reasons why Trial Reels are a game changer for creators:

Increased Exposure
- Trial Reels are shown to a broader, non-follower audience, significantly increasing the chances of content going viral. Katelyn highlights:
  
  "They get shown to non followers, which increases the chance of going viral. If your new reel resonates, it could lead to a big boost in followers and engagement." ([08:30])
Organic Growth
- By attracting new, genuinely interested audiences who haven't previously engaged with your content, Trial Reels facilitate authentic growth. She notes:
  
  "Trial reels help attract non followers who are genuinely interested in your new content. These are people who haven't seen your content before." ([10:15])
Low-Risk Content Testing
- Creators can experiment without the fear of negatively impacting their overall engagement metrics. If a Trial Reel doesn’t perform well, it can be deleted without your followers ever knowing. Katelyn mentions:
  
  "Trial reels allow creators to experiment without fear of low engagement that will impact their metrics." ([12:45])

How to Use Trial Reels: Step-by-Step Guide

Katelyn provides a clear, actionable guide on utilizing Trial Reels:

Create Your Reel
- Open the Instagram app and either upload or record your video to create a reel.
Enable Trial Mode
- Before posting, scroll to the caption screen and tap the settings button labeled "Turn on trial." Switch this option on to activate Trial Reels.
Post and Monitor
- Share your Trial Reel. Within 24 hours, Instagram provides analytics indicating the reel’s performance.
Decide to Share or Hide
- If the reel performs well based on initial analytics, you can choose to share it with all your followers. Alternatively, you can allow Instagram to automatically share it if it meets performance criteria within the first 72 hours.

Katelyn advises:

"I personally would probably choose the option where Instagram automatically does its thing because Instagram knows if it's performing well or not." ([20:10])

Best Practices for Trial Reels

To maximize the effectiveness of Trial Reels, Katelyn shares several best practices:

Define Your Testing Goals
- Clearly outline what you aim to achieve with each Trial Reel, whether it's exploring a new niche, experimenting with different content styles, or testing new formats.
- Katelyn emphasizes:
  
  "If you are going to do the trial reel, you need to define your goal." ([23:00])
Optimize for Non-Followers
- Tailor your content to appeal to a broader audience since Trial Reels reach users who do not follow you. Avoid overly specific language that might alienate potential new viewers.
- She advises:
  
  "Your hooks, your captions be a little bit more broad. Don't say, 'Hey, girl,' unless that's your specific audience." ([25:30])
Monitor Analytics Closely
- After posting, closely examine the performance metrics provided by Instagram to make informed decisions about whether to share the reel widely.
- Katelyn recommends:
  
  "Dig deep into those analytics and kind of decide, all right, were my views high? Did my engagement tick up a little bit?" ([27:15])
Strategic Testing
- Incorporate Trial Reels into your content strategy thoughtfully, perhaps limiting them to a few per week to maintain balance and prevent overuse.
- She suggests:
  
  "Maybe you do two trial reels a week. You don't want to overuse trial reels." ([29:00])

Real-Life Feedback: Brooke Monk’s Experience

To illustrate the practical benefits of Trial Reels, Katelyn shares insights from popular creator Brooke Monk, who has successfully leveraged this feature.

Brooke states:

"Trial reels have been a game changer for me. They've allowed me to experiment with content in a way that feels low pressure. Love that." ([32:50])

She continues to praise how Trial Reels have enabled her to reach new audiences and foster a creative environment without the stress of immediate public judgment.

Katelyn reflects:

"It's like having a creative playground for my brand." ([33:20])

This testimonial underscores the potential of Trial Reels to act as a safe space for creativity and innovation, allowing creators to expand their content repertoire confidently.

Recap and Conclusion

In summary, Episode 54 of Call Her Creator thoroughly explores Instagram Trial Reels, highlighting their significance in modern social media strategies. Katelyn Rhoades effectively conveys that:

Trial Reels serve as a low-risk platform for testing and refining new content ideas.
They offer substantial benefits, including increased exposure, organic growth, and the ability to experiment without jeopardizing existing engagement metrics.
By following best practices, creators can maximize the potential of Trial Reels to enhance their online presence and diversify their content offerings.

Katelyn concludes with a call to action:

"I want to know if you guys have tried the trial reels yet. Tag me in your trial reel. Send me a DM. I'd love to share more feedback." ([38:40])

She encourages listeners to engage with her and the broader creator community, fostering a collaborative environment for shared growth and success.

Final Thoughts

Katelyn Rhoades’ comprehensive discussion on Trial Reels provides valuable insights for creators aiming to innovate and expand their content horizons on Instagram. By embracing Trial Reels, creators can navigate the evolving social media landscape with confidence, creativity, and strategic intent.

Thank you for reading the detailed summary of Episode 54 of Call Her Creator. Stay tuned for more insights and strategies to empower your journey as a thriving online creator.

Transcript

A (0:00)

What's up everybody? Welcome to another episode of Call Her Creator, Powered by Stan. I am your host, Kaitlyn Rhodes, and today we are talking about trial reels. Now, I've been hearing the buzz about trial reels for a couple of weeks now. I have had yet to use them, but I have done all of my research so that I can start using them. What I'm hearing from other creators is that they're a really great way to go viral and you get to test your content before it actually goes out into the public. So if your content say it flops, you can just delete it and you never have to see it again and you don't have to be embarrassed. But if it performs well, then Instagram will keep sharing it to more and more people. So listen to this full episode. I've got a lot of tips for you. I've got some real life feedback from bigger creators out there, so you can decide if you want to try trial reels yourself or not. If you're new here, please hit that subscribe button. That lets me know that you're liking what I'm putting out and it will alert you next week when a new episode comes out. I also would love to hear your feedback on this podcast. I'm looking for some reviews right now, so please head over to Apple Podcast or Spotify. Leave me a little review, let me know what you're thinking. I would love to hear from you guys. All right, so if you've ever felt nervous about sharing a reel, Instagram is helping all of us little nervous nellies with trial reels. What are trial reels? So think of it as like a soft launch for your creativity. It lets you test experimental content on non followers before it goes out to your followers. Here's what I'm going to be teaching you guys today. First, we're going to talk about how trial reels even work while they're a game changer for creators and how to use them effectively for growth. So let's just get into it. So what are trial reels? Trial reels allow creators to post experimental content that only non followers will see. So if the reel performs really well, you could decide if you want to show it to your followers or keep it hidden. The benefits of trial reels are increased exposure, organic growth, and of course, content testing, which we all wish we could do, right? Like, don't you wish that you could put something out there, see if it performs well, and if it doesn't, you can hide it or you can keep pushing it out to more and more people that actually know who you are. I, for one, am really excited to use trial reels. The only reason I haven't so far is because it kind of rolled out during the holidays and I was just trying to survive. I'm sure you guys can all feel that. So just imagine, you've been known for fitness tips, but maybe you want to try sharing meal prep hacks. Maybe you want to expand on your content. Trial reels lets you test this idea without really overwhelming your current audience. So this is a really good way to just test the waters and get into new content without overwhelming people or confusing them. All right, so why are trial reels a game changer? There's a couple reasons. I've got three reasons that you should test them. One, increase exposure. Okay, so trial reels get shown to a broader audience. They're not getting shown to your audience. It's getting shared out to non followers, which increases the chance of going viral. If your new reel resonates, it could lead to a big boost in followers and engagement. Hi. The next one is organic growth. Trial reels help attract non followers who are genuinely interested in your new content. These are people who haven't seen your content before. It's people that have never seen your name, never seen your content. It's not people that already know what you're known for. Right. So you could honestly talk about anything you want when you're posting trial reels, because these people don't know you for a specific reason. So again, if you're wanting to test out something new, maybe you're a fitness instructor. Actually, I just gave y'all that example, so let's do another one. Maybe you are a. Hmm. Maybe you're a yoga instructor and you've only really been known to share yoga poses or stuff about your studio, yada, yada. But you really want to get into mindset and manifestation and all that goodness. So you start doing some trial reels of you talking about manifesting, and then you. You post those and they get posted to your non followers. And then the algorithm, Instagram, starts liking it. It's getting really good traction. What will happen is Instagram will say, hey, this is actually performing well. Do you want to post it to everybody? And then you get to say yes or no. I think this is wild and a great idea. And the more I talk about it, the more I'm like, why haven't you tried it yet? Gaitlyn. The last benefit of trying trial reels is that it's a low risk content testing. Right so trial reels allow creators to experiment with without fear of low engagement that will impact their metrics. Because really, at the end of the day, again, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work and you just hide it. If your reel doesn't perform well, no harm, no foul, you can delete it with your followers never even knowing that you tested a reel. So how can you use trial reels? Here are step by steps on how to use this feature. Okay, so the first thing you're going to do is you're going to open your Instagram app and you're going to create the reel. Then you're going to upload or record your video, create the reel. Then you will scroll down before you post. You'll scroll down on the caption screen and there will be a little settings button that says turn on trial. And so you just swipe that to turn on and then you share it. Within 24 hours of sharing your trial reel, Instagram is going to tell you if it's performing well or not. So per Instagram, I wrote it down. If your trial reel is performing well, you can choose to share with everyone so your followers can see it and increase its reach. Or when creating the trail reel, you can choose to have Instagram automatically share your reel if it's. If they determine that it's performing well, so you don't even have to think about it. I personally would probably choose that option because at the end of the day, Instagram knows if it's performing well or not. And it, like I would automatically let Instagram do its thing. You can always change that setting if you want. But if Instagram determines that it's performing well based on the views it receives within the first 72 hours, it will continue to share it to more and more people. So let's just say, for example, if your cooking hack gets lots of views but few likes, maybe that means that you refine it a little bit and share it again later. You don't ever show that trial reel, right? It's getting good, lots of views, but you really want, like, engagement, you want comments. So maybe you just tweak one little thing and repost it again. What I like about this is that it's giving you the opportunity to truly, like, evaluate your content and make it better before actually having to push it out into the world. So I've got some best practices for you guys when it comes to utilizing this feature. The first one is we want you to be clear about what you are testing. So if you are going to do the trial reel, you need to define your goal. What is it? Is it to explore a new niche? Is it to try a different style of reel? Is it to test a new format? An example here would be something like, if you're experimenting with a new style of storytelling, compare its performance to your usual reels and see if it performs well. If it does, obviously you're going to want to lean more into that type of content. If it doesn't, I wouldn't say 100% crop it. I would just say maybe do it maybe again, but a little bit different. And again, if that were to bomb, then maybe you're like, maybe that's like your sign to not do it that way. I guess the caveat here is you can't do it only one time and take those results. I typically will do something a couple times, and then if it flops a couple times, that's when I'm like, okay, this is not the right kind of format for my people, or this is not the type of content they want to hear from. Number two, best practice, optimize for non followers. So you have to remember you're posting this trial reel to people that do not follow you. So you don't have to be nitty gritty with it. You can be a little more broad with your audience, right? So your hooks, your captions be a little bit more broad. Don't say, hey, girl, because you don't know if a man or woman is going to see it unless that's your specific audience and you don't want to talk to men. Don't like right now, for me, I get better engagement from women. And I've looked at my analytics. I just connect more with them. So my captions and content are geared towards women. But if I was doing a trial reel, I would not gear it towards women. I would gear it just towards anybody. Just to see, maybe a man's gonna resonate with my content, and maybe he's got a good budget and could hire my social media agency. So why would I only talk to women for my trial reel, right? The third tip here is to monitor your analytics closely. I told you guys that after 24 hours, Instagram's gonna give you some analytics. They're gonna tell you about your views, your comments, your engagement. So really dig deep into those analytics and kind of decide, all right, were my views high? Did my engagement tick up a little bit? If the answer's no, you don't need to post that trial reel. If. If your answer is yes, post the Trial reel. It's not going to hurt you. And then obviously, you're going to want to test regularly, but strategically, I don't want you using trial reels all the time. Maybe you do two trial reels a week. You don't want to overuse trial reels. You just want to make it a part of a balanced content strategy. Right. To understand what content is going to resonate with a new audience to help you grow your account. I don't know if you guys follow Brooke Monk. She shows up on my Explore page all the time. I don't follow her. I should, but I'm very specific about who I follow because I'm really bad at toxic comparisons. And so I just. I don't follow her, but I see her and I respect her and love her content. Okay, she did the trial reels, and per Instagram, this is what they said on their website. Earlier this year, we began testing concepts to help tackle the challenge and have been incorporating lots of creator feedback into building trial reels. Already seeing early success from creators who have had access with their fresh content ideas, performing well with both new audiences and existing audiences. So Brooke says trial reels have been a game changer for me. They've allowed me to experiment with content in a way that feels low pressure. Love that. And I've seen them help me reach new audiences I might not have connected with otherwise. It's exciting to try out ideas and see what resonates. It's like having a creative playground for my brand. So I love that. Like, she's getting to test things with low pressure. Right. So you're not having to, like. I know there's so many times when I've wanted to try new content, and maybe I have, but I've just felt really, like, scared to put it out there because I'm scared of what people will think of me or what my followers will think of me. So really, this is a way for you to put stuff out there with low pressure. All right, so just to recap, we went over what trial reels are. They're basically like a little experiment for you when you're trying new content. They're valuable because they will help you reach a new audience. And I've taught you guys how to use them as. As Brooke said, it's your playground for creativity. Use it to grow, to pivot, to refine your content without the fear of backlash. Love that your audience is not ever. Shouldn't ever expect perfection from you guys. They really just want creativity. They want to be seen, feel felt. By Heard. So trial reels really give you the freedom to experiment and grow without those limits. I want to know if you guys have tried the trial reels yet. I want to see, like, can you tag me in your trial reel? Can you send me a dm? I'd love to share more feedback on trial reels. I'm gonna put a blog up on influencestudio.com influence with an e and we'll get some feedback from other creators out there. I'd love for some specific examples. So if you've done trial reels, send me the reel to my DMs. You can send it to Call her creator. My. My DMs don't get as messy over there, and I'd be so excited and grateful to share off your work with others. But if you haven't used trial reels, what's holding you back? You can always let me know too, in the DMs over there. And I will try some trial reels this week so that I can report back next week for you guys. All right, thanks, guys. I will see you next week. This is Call Her Creator. I'm Kaitlyn Rhodes, and we're out.