As the number of campaigns grew by nearly double last year, opportunities continue to rise for marketers who are looking to partner with influencers and drive more traffic on Instagram.
Instagram Ad Growth
A new study released by influencer marketing platform Klear revealed some very promising findings for Instagram’s sponsored advertising program. Most notably, the amount of advertisements soared by 198% from 2016 to 2017. Influencer marketing specifically has seen a consistent growth of 5% month over month, and is now set to become a $2 billion industry by 2019. Additionally, influencer ad spend is expected to reach between $5-$10 billion by 2022.
Over 1.5 million sponsored Instagram posts were analyzed using the #ad hashtag, which was enforced by the FTC in September of 2017 to show more ad transparency between influencers and their audience.
A Lack of Dissuasion
One of the most interesting discoveries in this report is the fact that since the FTC’s heightened regulation of the influencer marketing industry, influencers haven’t been deterred from running ads, contrary to what many had believed. In fact, the results have been quite the opposite, where sponsored influencer posts actually increased from 139 million in September 2017 to 171 million by December 2017.
Verticals & Demographics
Female influencers dominated the market in terms of posts that included the #ad or #sponsored tags. The average #ad post received 682 engagements, and amongst the leading verticals were beauty, fashion, food and beverage, fitness and wellness, automotive, consumer electronics, travel, entertainment, retail and technology.
From a consumer standpoint, 42% of all sponsored engagement fell under the 18-24 year age category. The 25-34 category was the second largest, accounting for 30%. Clearly Instagram is a strong platform to market to when trying to penetrate a millennial demographic.
Final Thoughts
As younger consumers continue to embrace social platforms and closely follow their favourite influencers, the ability for brands to create messaging that resonates with that audience and drives more conversions will inevitably increase. With that said, these insights come at a time where authenticity in messaging is paramount for success. Marketers and brands that establish a sincere, sentimental connection with their audience through influencer campaigns stand to gain a tremendous amount of traction as we move deeper into the year.