Instagram Insights is Instagram’s native analytics tool. It helps provide marketers with data on their followers, including details about the demographics of these followers, what actions they have taken, as well as how well a piece of content is performing on the social media site.
In this article, we will discuss how Instagram Insights can improve your marketing results.
Table of Contents
How Do Instagram Insights Work?
With the information on hand, marketers will be able to measure campaign performance, compare content to see what’s working and what isn’t, and keep tabs on how individual posts are performing.
The Insights feature is only available if you have an Instagram Business account, which is why it is recommended that you get one if you’re using this platform to promote your brand. You’ll instantly gain access to Insights the minute you switch to a business profile, and you won’t be able to view any sort of data at all if your profile remains personal.
On the Instagram app, you will find the Insights data located in three different sections. If you want to access Insights directly from your profile page, what you would need to do is look at the upper-right hand corner of your mobile phone screen, and then tap the bar graph icon at the top.
The main Insights home page will provide you with a summary overview of the data from the content which you have posted over the past seven days. You will be able to view details such as how many followers you gained over the past seven days, and how much engagement you received per post during that same period.
Insights is an extremely useful feature because it enables you to see important details, including:
- The behavior of your followers
- Gender
- Age
- Where your followers are located
- The number of times they are online in a day
- Filter your content according to metric, timeframe, and type of content
- The number of engagements you received on your profile
- The number of impressions you received
- The ratio of engagement and reach per post
- What were your best performing and worst performing content was
- Number of profile visits
- Number of website clicks
- Number of user accounts that have started following your profile
- View your Instagram Stories metrics
How To Use Instagram Insights
It can be difficult to know what to do once you gain access to Instagram Insights, but it is a great tool. Use these tips to grow your Instagram profile using Insights.
1. Measure reach
Click the Accounts Reached section. Your Instagram reach is the number of unique users who have viewed any of your posts.
In this category, you’ll find insights into:
- Top Posts: Posts with the most reach.
- Top Stories: The most popular Instagram Stories posts.
- Top IGTV Videos: Videos with the most views on IGTV.
- Impressions: The number of times your posts were viewed.
- Profile Activity: Profile visits, website taps, and other activities.
Some of these insights can be expanded for more insights.
2. Track profile visits and followers
Under Account Activity, you will be able to view Visits to Profiles under Accounts Reached.
Views of your profile reflect the number of times it has been viewed.
By dividing the number of followers by the number of visitors to your profile, you can find out how many visitors are becoming followers. Analyze this number over time to determine if your “conversion rate” is increasing or decreasing.
3. Determine website clicks
Accounts Reached > Profile Activity also displays Website Taps. Any links you have included in your business profile have been clicked on how often.
5. Track content interactions
Click Accounts Engaged on the Insights Overview. Your content engagement metrics will be broken down based on the type of content on this page.
The number of likes speaks for itself, showing how many people liked your post. Like likes, comments show how many comments you have received. Saves indicate how many unique users or accounts have saved your post. In case any of these numbers are low, you should reevaluate your Instagram strategy.
6. Track your followers
Click Total Followers on the Insights Overview page. This will take you to the Follower Breakdown page.
It displays how many followers you’ve gained or lost over the past week, as well as the hours of the day your followers are most active on Instagram – information useful for planning posts.
7. Identify the actions taken on your post
By visiting your profile, you can view insights for an individual Instagram post. To view insights on a post, tap the image, then click View Insights below it
In the “Profile Activity” section of your profile, you can see the number of actions users have taken after seeing your post, such as visiting your profile, following you, or clicking on your website link.
8. Use “Reach” to see where your post appeared in feeds
In the past, Reach was called “Discovery” – where your post was seen – or discovered – the most, including how many accounts weren’t already following you at the time the post was seen.
There is also a section for Impressions, which shows how many times your post has been discovered on Instagram, such as through a user’s home feed, a search, your profile, or a location tag.
In addition, reach insights include information about how many unique accounts saw your post.
9. View Story insights
Instagram users with a business profile can see insights into their ephemeral Stories.
You can view insights about your Story by going back to Insights and scrolling down to the Content You Shared section.
By scrolling down to the Stories section, you’ll find insights for older stories as well as those that have not yet expired.
Specific Insights You Can Explore
Impressions
Your Story has been viewed a total of how many times.
Keep in mind that you can add multiple images or videos to your Story when viewing these insights. You can count every piece of visual content in your Story as a single photo or video in your post if you do this.
Let’s say you upload six photos to your Story. No matter how many people view your entire Story, Instagram only counts one impression per person.
This also applies to Story content that has been viewed more than once by a single user. Instagram still counts those interactions as one impression for the entire Story.
Reach
Your Story’s unique viewers are reflected in this insight.
Taps Forward
This insight shows how often users skip to the next video or photo in your Story.
Taps Back
This insight shows how many times a user taps the previous piece of media in your Story.
Replies
The number of times your Story’s Send Message box has been used by users reflects this insight.
Swipe Aways
The number of times users swipe to skip to the next account’s Story should not be confused with the “tap forward,” which represents users skipping to your next piece of Story media.
Exits
Users leave the Stories section entirely to return to the home feed when using this insight.
Final Words
You can now use Instagram Insights to access data and analyze that data to determine what works best for your audience (and what doesn’t). If you consider those benchmarks, creating content that gets a lot of engagement will become a lot easier.