Instagram photo-sharing services started off more than a decade earlier (2010) as a simple website, inspired by a love of fine-quality bourbon and whiskey. Later it was sold to Facebook for 1 billion, and today it grows to be the 5th most used social media platform in 2021, according to Statistica, and offers a multitude of different options for people to be able to advertise and sponsor their products and services easily. There is not much of an alternative to Instagram photo sharing capabilities, while other websites might offer more when it comes to video and photo editing, Instagram’s popularity and the fact that many apps are built to support it gives it an edge. 

While Instagram is the number one photo-sharing service, its competitors also use visuals to attract users, and apps like TikTok are slowly overtaking Instagram, forcing it to change and adopt new ideas. Many big brands are becoming more comfortable using TikTok as a marketing tool, as challenges and music are fun ways to deliver content to gen z audiences. While there are more users on Instagram, TikTok’s current growth shows that soon it will overtake it if things stay as they are, and that is why Instagram needs to start changing. 

It is therefore wise for Instagram to stop for a second and see how it can capitalize on this information, and change tactics after doing so, for Instagram photo-sharing services will not be enough to hold it up, and as all other platforms are slowly developing their video capabilities, so should they. Instagram has also put priority on influencers and private messaging services and stressed the importance of developing them in order to keep the app interesting and developing it. Showing its interest in developing its messenger capabilities means that they are also viewing apps like WhatsApp as important competition. 

While video streaming services like google and tiktok are the target of Instagram’s boss’s latest statement, “Instagram is no longer a photo-sharing app”, where he sees the great opportunity tiktok has to offer, there are many new apps that will also capitalize on this and will soon pose a threat to Instagram. Instagram users have decreased on mobile phones, with much more people being interested in tiktok. While many of these are young people, Gen Z, tiktok enjoys a variety of different age groups and so is attractive to any business or person trying to advertise for themselves.

Tiktok pays special attention to creators, with a fund to help those with good potential of becoming one, ie, enough views in the last month and posting only original content. A new program called Tiktok’s next-level program will help those creators have all the tools they might need, and be able to connect with other creators to make life easier for them as they make a living out of the app. Instagram photo-sharing diversion will also include it giving more attention to creators and influencers.

Instagram creator profile first appeared in 2019 and is now an option for those who wish to make their account a creator account. It gives you the advantage of knowing more about your users and being able to manage your posts and direct messages easier. At the same time these influencers can be a threat should people start feeling that Instagram is too boring, with fewer and fewer posts from friends and people who are closer to you to more posts from brands, businesses, and influencers. This is one of the reasons why Instagram soon might prove to be not the best option for online ads and advertisements.

According to statistics, people in the UK from the age group of 18 to 25 spend around half an hour on tiktok, over an hour on youtube, and only around 10 minutes on Instagram. These 10 minutes are lower than the previous year. So will this push were shopping, influencers, and allowing posts from people who are not in your following list to appear to you change how Instagram is viewed? Will it give it the ability to rise against the boredom of Gen Z and other users who are no longer interested in spending their pandemic days on the app? Will Instagram photo-sharing services soon become irrelevant to influencers? We will have to wait and see.