How emojis affect engagement on Instagram
There was an increased use of emojis in 2016 and Instagram was no exception. How do they affect engagement though?
Quintly analyzed 20,000 Instagram profiles and 6.2 million posts during 2016 to observe how emojis have been used in the popular social platform in the last year.
Analyzing the use of emojis on Instagram
Emojis have become very popular and it’s no surprise that 56% of Instagram profiles have already used them.
In fact, there has been an increase of 20% on their use during 2016, which means that this fun and quick visual form of communication is not expected to go away anytime soon.
Bigger profiles use more emojis
It’s interesting that Instagram profiles with a large number of followers tend to use emojis more frequently comparing to smaller accounts. This may be justified by their attempt to feel closer to their audience, either as influencers, or as brands.
Emojis can build a personal connection and as they go beyond the younger generation nowadays, they serve as a new form of instant communication which usually adds the right context to each post.
How emojis affect engagement
It has been observed that posts with emojis receive higher interaction rate, as the average post receives a 17% higher interaction rate than posts without emojis during 2016.
This can encourage more brands to use emojis as part of their Instagram captions, aiming at improving their interaction rate in the most relevant way.
However, there is a danger here of over-using emojis, which may lead in alienating users and reduce the existing interaction rate.
Most popular emojis
The most popular emoji of 2016 was the camera, which is usually used as a way of attributing an image. This may also prove the rise of user-generated content, along with the importance of crediting the owner of the content.
As for the use of emojis in image and video posts, there doesn’t seem to be a difference on the frequency that emojis are used among the two types of content, which means that their popularity does not depend on a specific format.
The full Instagram study can be accessed here
How brands should use emojis on Instagram
It’s important for brands to keep in mind that emojis are still not replacing text and customers expect them to be used in a frequency that does not become annoying.
There’s no need to try too hard with emoji marketing if it doesn’t offer the right value to your marketing and your message. Emojis can still add an additional layer of playfulness to your captions, so don’t be afraid to use them.
There are lots of examples to motivate you to do so.
This article first appeared in www.clickz.com
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