The Instagram marketing strategy can be difficult to come up with, and harder to implement and fine-tune. The platform has grown over the years from supporting only square pictures to now supporting short and long videos, slideshows, ephemeral stories, and much more. Along with these changes, the scope of what you can achieve on the platform as a brand marketer and how you can do it has also been revolutionized entirely.

When it comes to understanding how successful your latest post has been, the two most popular and convenient metrics are likes and views. Without either of the two, organic growth can be hard to achieve and sustain on the platform. You must aim to gain both, but the way you target each and the priority you assign them can change your returns drastically.

Instagram has replaced the “likes” count that you see on most posts with a “views” counter below videos specifically since they believe it is a more accurate way to show the number of impressions the content received. This introduction has caused consternation among several business users, who are not sure about what to make of it.

There are no plans to port the view count to photo-posts soon, which experts agree is the right move since users seeing how many people viewed a post but scrolled past it without engaging can be demotivating and push them off the platform. For videos, the views to engagement ratio are worth considering because videos tend to have calls to action that are worth inspecting.

Adds Credibility to Your Content

View counts are publicly available to anyone viewing the post, which means they also add legitimacy to the content. Users are quick to scroll by posts marked as “Sponsored”, but if they find a sponsored video that has a very high view count, they might give it the benefit of the doubt and watch it. The view count exists to show them how many of their peers watched the video, and it helps because they tend to trust other users more than the brands that create and promote such content. It will eventually reflect in other metrics like engagement and conversions for you. This peer-vetting strategy is why Facebook also shows you how many users have shared or reposted a particular video. The increasing view count means it is likely something that will add value to their lives, and also something that they might regret missing out on. You may buy views for IG to instantly boost your post’s total number of Instagram views.

Psychological Reasons for Picking Views over Likes

People often do not want to be associated with brands or viewed as just customers. This can lead to them, for example, not engaging in videos created by brands, but it may not push them away from watching the content altogether. By reflecting the number of people who watch the content, Instagram can effectively bridge the gap between the thousands of viewers who are not averse to watching and enjoying some content as it comes up on their feed but always scroll past it once they are done. This move also brings it closer to other video-centric platforms, most notably YouTube, that have been displaying the View counts for years. It allows the statistics to be easily comparable across platforms and also gives a more accurate view of how attractive your video content is.

What to Aim for and How

Just because view counts are now put under each video does not mean that you can or should forget about likes and comments entirely. It is worth noting that each metric has a very specific meaning and together their performance provides a holistic input about the performance of your entire marketing strategy. Engagement is still king on platforms like Instagram, which means while views are important; you cannot discount the concept of getting people who like the content to physically like it via a double-tap, and also leave a comment or tag someone in their network that they think might be interested. You must aim to increase your performance across each of these fronts. The way you target them and how you prioritize them is entirely up to you and might change the entire narrative for your efforts as well as their results.

Perhaps the most effective way to get some eyeballs and also boost organic conversions is to hold contests and giveaways. There is something inherently thrilling about these events and that has led to more and more people flocking to posts where they find contests or ongoing giveaways. Pick something you will not have trouble hosting, do not go too far overboard, and also change the rules for the giveaway to suit your efforts and needs. Whether you are organizing these events yourself or taking the use of sophisticated digital tools, the key is that you keep encouraging healthy engagement and honor any commitments you make, especially in sending out prizes.

Instagram “views” versus Instagram “likes” is a kind of debate that may go on endlessly. However, as per https://www.forbes.com, Instagram authorities want all your followers to concentrate on specifically what you are posting and sharing on the platform instead of focusing your attention on how many likes were acquired by your posts. Instagram has been aiming since 2019, to eliminate the likes count from your posts so that only you could see the exact number of likes fetched by your Instagram posts. Nobody else can see how many likes, your video or post got. 

Conclusion

The total number of Instagram video views in the overall Instagram marketing scheme could appear to be a petty iteration. However, its importance cannot be exaggerated or overstated. For the business keen on Instagram marketing, the current switchover from likes on Instagram posts to just the view counts could make things quite convenient and easier for generating super-quick credibility. The previous popularity metric or the likes had taken months of meticulous campaigning. If you share a compelling video that is strategically placed in the correct feeds could help in boosting views overnight. Social proof in terms of view counts seems much better for your brand. However, refrain from treating it as the best engagement metric. 

Author’s Bio: 

Pete Campbell is a social media manager who has worked as a database administrator in the IT industry and has immense knowledge about email marketing and Instagram promotion. He loves to travel, write and play baseball