With its design, Instagram devotes the greatest emphasis to beautiful photographs, which are the ideal for exposing the products – and now also for shopping.

With more than a billion users and the largest number of active registered profiles among all social networks, Instagram is definitely a new home for businesses that strive to build a base of loyal followers.

There are already 130 million people shopping on Instagram every month

Instagram presented the shopping feature in its test phase in March 2017 and experienced an excellent users’ response. In 2018, the shopping option was complemented and gradually expanded to most countries – including Slovenia. The platform enables the companies to tag the products in their posts and thus offer the users to purchase them within the platform. Despite the fact that the shopping feature is relatively new, about 130 million users every month do their purchase on Instagram.

Unobtrusive introduction of novelties

One of the reasons of accepting this feature so well by the users is surely the nature of the new feature. It is very nicely integrated into the platform being unobtrusive and user-friendly. Posts still look as they did before, and the novelty is only a small icon indicating that it is a post with a purchase option. Only when the user clicks on the post, the name and price of the product displays and the product can be purchased without leaving the app. This way, Instagram ensured that shopping became easier and integrated into the routine of regular platform users.

60% of users on Instagram search for new products

The second reason for the excellent response is the demography and type of users. Research has shown that as many as 60% of users (majority women) use Instagram to search for new products and follow their favourite brands. This is also evident in the engagement itself as companies here achieve ten times better engagement of followers than on Facebook and other social networks. Those companies that acted smartly on Instagram have already built a base of loyal followers who gladly and on a daily basis follow their novelties, view their products and regularly engage in their posts. Thus the new Instagram feature connected the target audience that craves for the latest products with the companies that are able to present these products personally and quickly, as well as sell them.

Due to the quantity and type of users, the new feature will be worthwhile to pay more attention to in the future. I doubt that Instagram will soon become the new Amazon, but the possibility of buying will definitely take the platform to the next level.