Hey Instagram – Get With The Program!

For those of you who manage multiple Instagram accounts, you know my struggle. For those of you who only use Instagram to post the daily events of your life, this rant isn’t going to make sense.

First, a few facts from Simply Measured: Instagram has more than 200 million monthly active users, 60 million photos posted daily, and an average of 1.6 billion Likes every single day. It’s one of the most popular social media programs in the world and 86% of the world’s top brands have Instagram accounts.

So why it is that one of the world’s most exceptional branding platforms for marketers is the most difficult to manage?

Problem #1: You can’t switch between accounts. For the average user, this doesn’t mean anything. But for the director of a social media department, it’s beyond frustrating. I love my clients and I will continue to sign in and out of multiple accounts on a daily basis – but I’m NOT going to like it. Please take a queue from your big brother Facebook and make managing different accounts an easier process.

Problem #2: Crashing. So you don’t like that beautiful photo my photographer shot last week? Sorry. Why don’t you crash on me several times to teach me a lesson? I am all about using Instagram the au naturel way to capture a moment in my client’s life. However, I don’t think my phone should be punished for wanting to #latergram a photo from last night’s event.

Problem #3: How’s My Account Doing? Who knows. Ok, this isn’t really a problem because there are many ways for me to calculate the success of an Instagram post/campaign. But with how in-depth Facebook’s Insights are, I feel like Instagram should be a little more on top of it.

Problem #4: There are a limited number of accounts you can create from one device. This was the source of my most recent frustrations and what led me to write this angry blog. I understand your concern with preventing spam accounts. And kudos to you for deleting thousands of spammers last month! But I just want to do my job. Thank goodness there are 20 other smartphones around me – but there needs to be a better way.

To sum it up, I respect that Instagram is built for the user and not the marketer. I would just like it to show us a little compassion.

Sorry Instagram. I love you, I really do.
End rant.

– Anna Gonzalez, Outreach & New Media Manager

2 thoughts on “Hey Instagram – Get With The Program!”

  • We hear you, Anna! I wrote about this back in September of last year, and quickly realized that so many others out there (you included) all share in on the frustration!

    Who knows why they haven’t solved this problem for marketers. From my post: “My guess is that maybe Instagram thinks posting from a desktop browser (or third party app) would take away from the “insta” nature of it? Maybe they worry marketers will ruin the community’s organic-ness of the network?”

    • Anna Gonzalez says:

      Thank you for understanding! I know why they’re worried about protecting the user, but… I selfishly want it to be more convenient.
      =)

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