5 Instagram Trends 2022 – What You Should Know

And in 2021, Instagram had a lot of updates. New features have appeared: the ability to add music to stories, hide likes under posts, a section with short videos Reels, Live Rooms. The social network continues to grow and remains a powerful platform for promoting business and personal brands. To keep up with your competitors, you need to constantly monitor new trends and adapt them to your account. Let’s see what trends will rule the roost this year.

1 Reel and The Video Format in General

Since 2019, all marketers, social media, and PR specialists have been shouting: “People, learn how to shoot and edit videos. It will be in high demand soon.” This moment has come. In 2021, Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri announced plans for the social network and called TikTok and YouTube its main competitors. “We are no longer a square photo-sharing app,” he said. This is why you need various tricks, like Instagram save videos. Although this social network still cannot download the video directly, you can save Instagram video for offline use with Inflact free web service.

Today, TikTok and Reels are capturing not only the younger generation but also established bloggers and experts in all fields. This is a good channel to attract free followers and attention to your account. What to shoot? Life hacks, tutorials, Humor, funny life stories.

2 Negligence and Authenticity in The Feed

The ideal Instagram life is infuriating today. People are tired of photoshopped photos, simulated happiness, successful success. The Instagram trend for 2022 is authenticity, honesty, sloppiness. In order to upload photos to the feed, you no longer have to try. Previously, this rule was suitable for stories, but now in this regard, stories and the feed seem to have swapped places.

The trend has already been picked up by major bloggers – many of their photos are deliberately careless, in the style of “taken a picture and posted it right away”, supposedly random shots. They can be in grain, in gray lighting. It can be just a photo of the house in the mirror or a “shaggy” portrait.

3 Building a Close-Knit Community

In 2022, bloggers and brands will try to create a society around them. Being in social isolation and switching to remote work, people acutely felt the lack of communication. They want to unite with like-minded people, communicate in a safe zone where they will be understood and supported. Anyone who can create such a place will receive a loyal audience.

Uniting people with similar values into a cohesive community is the main Instagram trend of 2022

To create a community, you need to:

• Study your target audience, its values, and needs;
• When creating content, focus on common values with the target audience;
• Engage the audience in a dialogue;
• Give people a benefit (a place where they can express their point of view, get support, communicate with like-minded people, etc.).

4 Joint Posts & Polls

In 2021, Instagram introduced the ability to create collaborative posts – Collabs. Such a post appears immediately with two authors, likes and comments in it are common. Also, the Collabs feature allows owners of two accounts to jointly edit a post. To create such a post, you need to add a tag to the publication and at the same time select the option “Add collaborator”. After the second author confirms the post, it will appear on two accounts.

Another trend in 2022 is audience surveys. Today, more than ever, people want to be heard, and their opinion is not only asked, but also taken into account. Here’s what you can do:

• Ask the audience what topics of publications they are most interested in (it will help build a content strategy);
• Upload different versions of images, design, and ask which one you like best (it will help you understand which visual can get more response);
• Ask people about personal preferences (people love to give advice and talk about themselves, asking questions to subscribers will increase their loyalty).

5 Microinfluence

Influencers are opinion leaders that their audience listens to. They are distinguished by the trust of the audience, good involvement in the blog, and sincerity. In 2022, the number of influencers will grow. It is very easy to create an account on a social network, and thanks to free promotion methods, you can gain an audience of 500-1,000 subscribers in a few months. The number of creators continues to grow and brings new meaning to the influencer marketing industry. We predict that in the next 5 years, 1 billion people will identify themselves as creators.

At the same time, brands are increasingly looking for micro-influencers, with an audience of 1,000 to 100,000 users, and even nano-influencers, whose accounts barely have 1,000 followers. They are more like bloggers and celebrities than real consumers, they build trusting relationships with the audience and therefore their advertising is believed.

Conclusion

Trends don’t usually come out of nowhere. Therefore, it is worth keeping a close eye on these trends so that you can take them into account when promoting your personal and corporate brand. And at the end of the year, it will be interesting to see which of these trends have become the most important and how social networks will develop further.