Given the relative popularity of Notes among younger users, it makes sense that Instagram is trying to capitalize on the option as much as it possibly can.
This week, Instagram added 2-second looping videos to Notes, providing another engagement option within its top-of-inbox prompts.
And now, it’s testing another option which would enable users to add Notes to their regular feed posts in the app.
As you can see in this example, posted by app researcher Ahmed Ghanem, Instagram’s internally testing the capacity to add a note within the post upload flow, which would provide an additional element of context to your posts.
Viewers would then be able to tap on the profile bubble on a post to see that Note, which could be another way to prompt engagement in the app.
Notes, as, um… noted, have been especially popular with younger IG users, with teen users creating Notes 10x more than others in the app. And given that Instagram has been losing ground to TikTok among younger audiences, it’s keen to double-down on that engagement, by injecting Notes into every surface that it feasibly can.
So while you might not like them, and maybe you’ve never used Notes yourself, younger people do, and Instagram really wants to keep that group engaged, because IG is Meta’s best bet at maintaining connection to the next generation of users.
All going to plan, that next generation will also be the first generation of metaverse users, which is another reason why Meta really needs to keep them around.
Hence, if anything even looks like it’s resonating among younger groups, it’s going to get more focus.
There’s no word on this test going live with users as yet.