Kayla Itsines: Australian fitness trainer made popular from her Bikini Body guide with 22.5 million likes on her Facebook page and 11.2M followers on Instagram. I’m sure most of you have heard of her or seen her on your socials- be it intentionally or unintentionally.
I for one, am not one of her 11.2 million followers, however I know how far along into her pregnancy she is (32 weeks by the way!), that she doesn’t like going for runs, that she recently became engaged and what type of exercises she does at the gym.
How do I know all of this?
2 words.
Sponsored. Posts.
What are sponsored posts? Sponsored posts are content that businesses (or people) pay to promote.
Their content then ends up on a Facebook or Instagram timeline, in between Instagram and Snapchat stories and lastly in the mind of the viewer (you!).
With Instagram’s community consisting of more than 700 million accounts, and an engagement rate higher than any other social media platform, Instagram is becoming a popular choice for businesses to reach both current and potential consumers.
As seen in the video above, with a payment of as little as $6 over 6 days, a sponsored Instagram post has the ability to reach hundreds of people at a time resulting in boosted visibility and increased brand awareness. Sign me up!!!
I, for one, am a consumer who has watched a sponsored Instagram story, swiped up on the link and purchased an item. Or has found new clothing brands or stores through their presence on my Instagram timeline through their sponsored posts- which then resulted in a 1) a new follower and 2) a new potential customer.
What do you guys think? I know I’m not the only one who has succumb to purchasing, following or even just retaining knowledge due to sponsored posts… Tell me about your experiences!
Sources
https://www.lyfemarketing.com/blog/facebook-sponsored-posts/
https://nealschaffer.com/4-benefits-advertising-instagram/
http://www.businessofapps.com/data/instagram-statistics/
Hey Glory! Great post! I have purchased products due to an ad I saw on Instagram. I bought like a guide to using Photoshop that was one sale. I think another great thing about having sponsored posts is that Instagram shows these posts to users who would be interested in them using algorithms, increasing the likelihood that they would click on the post and purchase the item.
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So true Alvin. It’s really interesting how they can distinguish what we like depending on the accounts we follow as well- especially when there’s so many of us on Instagram (700 million to be exact!).
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Such a relevant trend to write on Glory!! I remember when Instagram was first introduced, there was no sight of sponsored posts but as soon as the app’s popularity grew, savvy marketers wasted no time in using it as a channel to communicate with consumers! Super interesting too that we now have technology that is able to tailor advertisements to us depending on what we search for and what we like!!
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It’d be silly to not take advantage of it! It’s such a great resource for consumer interaction and reaching a global market
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I have actually also seen Kayla’s sponsored posts on Instagram several times. So I can definitely understand knowing so much information about something or someone on Instagram without even following them, because there are so many of these ‘sponsored posts’ from them. But I am not too sure if I like the idea of seeing these posts since I find some of them quite irrelevant. Other than that, it was a great post!!
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I think its a really clever way to get yourself out there, but of course to an extent.. when its too much it can definitely be annoying!
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I often wonder if people/celebrities can lose credibility if they use sponsored posts too often? Surely their posts become less relevant if we know they are being paid to write them?
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I definitely think that sponsored posts are great to an extent. From personal experience (and from a consumer’s point of view), if I see that most of an influencer/celebrity’s content is sponsored, I loose ‘trust’ in their judgement
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