The competition in the social media space never lets up and apps are either plugging ahead with innovative new features or playing catchup with rivals.
Depending on how you look at it, Instagram’s Channels could be a bit of both but one thing is certain: It will have a global audience starting now.
Initially beta tested among a select group, Meta announced that its Telegram competitor feature for Instagram would become a mainstay of the platform moving forward. For those of you that might not be familiar with Telegram or what Channels might offer, it is yet another way for creators to communicate directly with fans albeit sans interactions outside of poll responses or react emojis.
So, why is Meta rolling all of this out to a global audience? The only thing that matters when it comes to social media: Increased engagement. Apparently, Channels was a raging success in terms of keeping people engaged with Instagram.
Looking ahead, Meta plans on iterating on the service and hints at a collaboration feature in the future that will allow creators to team up and share audiences for one reason or another. There’s also going to be a whole Channels discovery feature in the future that will suggest further content for users to explore which sounds somewhat like YouTube, among other things. Of course, all of this ties in with the general push to monetize features and communities on the app and Channels gives creators yet another way to make some money off of their Instagram content.
Do you use Instagram for personal reasons or for business? Let us know what you think of the platform’s endless addition of features in the comments section.
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