What Are Impressions on Instagram? And Do They Really Matter?
When it comes to Instagram, you'll constantly hear the conversation about analytics. Yet, there is rarely time taken to explain what Instagram analytics mean.
We want to stop, rewind, and go back to the basics here. What are impressions on Instagram and do they actually matter to our socials?
What are impressions on Instagram?
Instagram impressions are described as, "the total number of times your content is displayed." When you are scrolling through your Instagram feed and watch the same Reel three times, the Reel will receive three impressions from you! This is often confused with Instagram reach. Instagram reach refers to the number of unique viewers seeing the content. So, for those three times, you watched the Reel in the example above, the reach would be one since you are the same viewer.
Do Impressions Matter On Instagram?
Yes! Each Instagram insight serves its purpose and is important for looking into certain situations and details. Looking at impressions can be valuable in what behavior of your viewer. When comparing it to other analytics such as reach and engagement metrics, we can things like, why did they view it so many times (was it confusing, was the print too small, where are they trying to relate to it but they couldn't), why didn't they engage with the content after viewing, etc., so you can learn and improve your content for next time!
So, yes, they do matter in the grand scheme of things, but are they the best impressions to focus on? When it comes to measuring the success of a piece of content, we like to focus more on reach and engagement because those are the metrics that align most with our social media goals. Since we don't often know the exact journey of how or why the person viewed the content and how we interpret the impressions affect it, it might not be that strong of a metric overall. However, everyone has different goals when it comes to socials, so it might look different for you specifically. Our best advice is to make sure you are creating goals for your social media (strategize!!!!) and see how impressions fit within those goals for you.
