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Instagram Live was interesting to me but took a while to roll out across the globe. So I blogged about where to find it and why to ignore it.
That blog post showed up over 1 million times in search results in 90 days, and more than 10 percent – more than 100,000 people – clicked over to the post and ended up on my blog. They came from many different countries, and some even emailed me to let me know they still didn’t have access to the live video feature.
“I’m in California and my friend has it, but I don’t. Why not?”
“I’m in Australia and am using an Android …”
Others emailed to say they couldn’t find it. My first picture of it came from an agency friend in Germany. I didn’t get it until a week or two after publishing the post with her photo.
Here is a look at the numbers from Google Search Console, which I use to track Search Engine traffic.
Interestingly, my blog post on average showed in position No. 6. So not the top spot, but on page 1 of Google Search Results.
During that 90-day period and even right after, I kept an eye out for how many people now actually do Instagram Live videos. The answer from what I’ve seen is: Few to hardly anyone goes live on Instagram.
I was even at a conference where an Instagram expert was broadcasting the talk live to a relatively low number of viewers.
Many were wondering when they would get it. Maybe to evaluate it! That’s always a good strategy. See what the new things are about and then determine if they’re worth using.
Instagram Live video is hardly worth doing. I see nobody doing it. And some rock stars get a few hundred viewers. Even few of them continue doing it regularly.
It’s certainly a problem that you just go live. No headline. No context as the live hit is published.
Periscope, Twitter and Facebook Live all allow more context. YouTube Live as well.
Instagram does show the “top live videos” in search results. But who are these people? And what is their broadcast on? It’s just missing the context.
Was it still worth writing about the topic? Yes, and here’s why:
- It ensured I knew the details about a new social media tool that clients likely would ask me about.
- It drew a lot of traffic.
- It helped me double my email list.
Checking out new tools is the way to go, even if we end up not using them. It’s today’s social media world. Things change. And it’s important to keep up on things.
There are new tools that we need to evaluate and maybe try. We either continue using them or put them in the parking lot. Either decision is fine – as long as it’s based on a quick evaluation.