“Reels are doing SO WELL right now!”
“I know, that’s all Instagram wants us to post these days huh?”
This was a conversation between a model and a photographer in a cafè last Sunday morning.
You know it’s time to get serious when non-professionals have an opinion about digital strategies.
So I thought I’d clarify WHY is it that Instagram (and most other platforms) is prioritizing Reels and HOW you can capitalize on that. Let’s go!
THE KEY CURRENCY OF SOCIAL MEDIA IS TIME
It’s not followers.
It’s not engagement rate.
It’s not posting daily.
It’s time, and specifically: how does YOUR content help INSTAGRAM make more money?
The longer you stay on any social media, the more ads you see. The more ads per person Instagram shows the more money they make.
So as a creator/business owner, how do you take advantage of this?
Step 1) Understand the logic
This is the easiest step: just read until the end and you’ll have it figured out.
Have you ever heard anyone saying “organic reach is dead, Facebook now is pay-to-play!!” or “Oh yeah, you can’t get good reach unless you pay for it” orrrrr my personal favorite “once you pay for ads you can never stop because otherwise your reach drops”.
So this is what bad marketers say to cover their a** and not have to work hard at creating a converting social media strategy for you with actually good content. If you are paying for this advice, run to the nearest emergency exit, because you’re being fooled.
Without organic content, no platform will keep users engaged enough to show them ads (TO THEN MAKE MONEY, in case the end goal of the Forbes 100 companies wasn’t clear). Organic content is necessary.
Let’s say the last post you did was a photo of one of your products with a nice, descriptive caption.
How many seconds do you think people have looked at it?
1?
5?
20?
Now let’s say you instead post a 2-minute Reel that shows how your product is made.
How many seconds do you think people spend on it?
30?
60?
200?
Whenever people comment, like, or share that post –> how many seconds does this take? How quickly can you type a paragraph? How quickly do you comment a heart and move on to the next post?
So if you’re the big Instagram boss, and you see that your last post (the 2 min one) is keeping people glued to the screen for 200 seconds…
… the logical next step is to show those same watchers more content from you…
… and show the same content to similar people as your watchers…
… and show them more similar content the next day…
This means users are suddenly spending 20 minutes scrolling Reels instead of 5 minutes looking at static images.
You gotta admit, it’s a pretty genius move.
Step 2) Use this to your advantage
The conclusion isn’t “POST REELS EVERY DAY THEY’RE DOING SO WELL OMG BABE”
The conclusion is: what can you show your audience that’s going to make them stop the scroll, read carefully, reply slowly, and watch again?
Which means… how are you going to make people SPEND MORE TIME on your content?
The result can look like an image where you share a personal story.
Or a 2-minute reel with an interesting video (and transitions make any video more fun to watch, just like great/bad dancing) that everyone wants to know the ending of.
Or a carousell that people WANT to read.
Step 3) Apply this to any other platforms
This isn’t a get-rich-quick tactic that only works until the next algorithm changes.
This is a BIG IDEA strategy that you can apply to any social media from TikTok to Linkedin to whatever will be trending next year.
Don’t get lost in the sea of boring, click-baity advice such as “the best caption has 7 words and 13 emojis”. That’s not the point. The whole point is TIME.
Specifically for Instagram, my friend Katya has professionally designed a Canva template kit that helps you create Reels from “stock videos” or your own b-roll videos in 5 minutes.
You can grab it here for only $33 USD
You know I’m a strategy/numbers person and not a designer, so I’d rather recommend someone else’s great product rather than make my own uglier version.
I hope this was helpful! If you enjoyed the read, please share this blog post with a friend.
