Instagram followers and engagement has skyrocketed among brands and celebrities over the past year, according to a study by ARK Investment Management, illustrating that the photo-sharing social platform “seems to be cementing its position as the ideal platform for premium brand advertising.”
“In May 2015, ARK did its first survey of user engagement with the three largest social platforms: Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. We found that, while Facebook dominated in absolute reach and Twitter owned real-time news, Instagram was becoming the go-to destination for savvy brands and celebrities,” according to James Wang, an analyst with ARK’s Next Generation Internet team. “In June of 2016, we repeated the same survey. While we expected similar trends, we were surprised at how much Instagram followers and engagement have skyrocketed among brands and celebrities.”
Instagram began to overtake Facebook and Twitter in these areas in the second quarter of 2015 (Instagram also surpassed Twitter in terms of monthly active users in 2015 as well). Nike saw a major jump in net Instagram followers over the past year, jumping by almost 30 million; H&M also netted about 7 million new Instagram followers during the past year.
“We think Instagram could capture a large share of premium print and TV advertising dollars as they migrate online,” Wang added.
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