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Instagram has made public the number of times a post is shared—a metric that previously brands and creators could only see on the platform’s backend—indicating the growing importance of sharing as a success metric.
Adweek and several other sources noticed the metric appearing alongside the paper plane share icon earlier this year, with one source noticing public share counts as early as August. Other sources say the feature is not yet visible on their accounts.
In March, a creator economy newsletter written by Lindsey Gamble, associate director of influencer innovation at influencer platform Mavrck, noted public share counts on Meta’s short-form video product, Reels.
Meta did not return requests for comment.
Many facets of the feature are still unclear, like what constitutes a share—it could be posting to the Story feature, sharing via a direct message, sending a link outside the platform or all of the above—and why public share counts are only appearing next to certain accounts. But the newly public metric is emblematic of a shift in social strategy away from likes and comments and toward sharing and building community, four social and creator sources told Adweek.
“You’re not paying people to grow the footprint for your post. It’s a cheat to media,” said Katie McDonald, head of strategy at agency We Are Social. “[Sharing] is the holy grail. You’re turning a participant into a brand ambassador.”
The growing importance of shareability is reflective of changing user behavior. Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri said on a podcast earlier this summer that teens spend most of their time on Instagram in DMs, followed by Stories, and then in feed. Also at play is the growing importance of regular people in marketing strategies, as word of mouth moves to digital and the line between customer and influencer blurs.
Boosting influencer content killed likes
Comments and likes used to be critical business metrics for evaluating the success of organic social strategy, said Brandon Perlman, CEO of micro-influencer agency Social Studies.
Likes were already becoming a less relevant metric two years ago when Instagram gave users the option to hide their like counts, and industry understanding grew that likes and followers could be bought.
Brands also have less need for likes and shares with the availability of Instagram’s partnership ads, originally launched as branded content ads in June 2019, which let brands amplify content from creators. Traditionally, ad buying on Instagram was creator-agnostic, and brands could not amplify creators’ posts with paid media.
“The second you as a brand could boost influencer content, [likes and comments] stopped mattering,” Perlman said. “Then you could replace those likes with buying the necessary reach.”
Still, some brands are hanging onto older metrics like followers to validate social success, even though sharing can help grow follower count, said social strategist Kendall Dickieson, who has worked for advertisers like olive oil brand Graza and beer brand Talea.
“’We want more followers’ was the No. 1 KPI (key performance indicator),” she said. “Now, brands are recognizing that to have more followers, you need to create content that your customer wants.”
‘Group-chat worthy’ content
In the wake of likes and comments, shares and saves are increasingly important KPIs for social pros, with three strategists saying that they aim to create content that is “group-chat worthy.”
“We’ve weighted measurement [of organic social] toward active participation,” McDonald said. “Shares and saves are the most active form. Comments can get spammy. Likes are very passive.”
If Instagram makes public share counts more widespread, it will be a helpful indicator for marketers deciding whether to implement a particular content strategy, Dickieson said.
However, some brands might not want competitors to know how popular their content is.
With share counts public, effective social strategy will be judged on whether the content chimes with audiences, which puts more pressure on brands to devise posts that work, McDonald said.
“You cannot exist within organic social unless you’re not primarily there to spark connection,” she added. “There is no [other] reason to be there.”
