No matter how well-crafted your contents are – sharp images, clever captions, perfectly made hashtags, etc., you need to satisfy the Instagram algorithm to make it viral and attract likes and views, and comments.
Learning your way to help Instagram’s algorithm to love your posts is all that you need to trigger a surge of Instagram likes!
But first, what is the Instagram algorithm?
The Instagram algorithm is very much similar to Facebook’s algorithm.
When put in simple words, it is a set of rules which have the potential to rank contents in a user’s feed. This is done by inspecting everything about content in detail by taking the metadata, analyzing the engagement metrics, hashtags, and more. Based on this gathered information, the algorithm distributes the contents across the feeds of Instagram users. This way, it becomes easier for the users to access the contents of their choice.
Over the past few years, the Instagram algorithm decided what types of content the user must see in their content- there was no option for changing it. But lately, Instagram has come up with two new updates that help improve the feed settings:
- An organized list of recent posts from accounts that are marked favorites by the user
- Chronological order
Though these changes have been introduced, many users still prefer the default feed. Therefore, it is important to understand the nature of content that Instagram algorithms prioritize and those that are pushed to the bottom.
How does the Instagram algorithm function?
There are a variety of classifiers that filters the contents by analyzing the specific behavior of the users. Every time a user opens their Instagram, the algorithm runs a quick sweep across every content and deploys the available classifiers to rearrange the feed.
Instagram’s algorithm decides the order of stories and posts based on the following factors –
- Content information- The classifiers arrange the contents as per the number of likes, views, tagged location, etc. this way, the algorithm decides the popularity of your contents.
- Poster’s information – An Instagram algorithm is embedded with features that keep track of how much you have interacted with a particular post and deduce how exciting they are to you.
- Your activity on this platform – The algorithm also gauges posts you have interacted with the most and what kind of content you interact with.
Apart from these, there are scores of other factors like which posts appear at the top of your news feed and their sequence. Posts that appear on the search and explore tab, the sequence of reels and stories, and live videos are also considered. Moreover, the relevance of your content, your relationship and engagement levels with your followers, and how timely you are with posting content, also matter.
It is important to understand that each section on Instagram considers your details. And this is not standard for all types of content; Instagram considers slightly different factors for stories, feed posts, reels, live videos, etc., to appear on your feed.
