Now all users, although so far only iOS devices, have the ability to change the shape of the overlay image to an asterisk, circle or heart

Honestly, I love these visual Instagram updates that relate to Stories.

Because they allow you to make your stories more unique / memorable right from the app!

On June 8, the head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, released an article with an intriguing title: "Shedding More Light on How Instagram Works", where he shared the key factors that affect the ranking / reach / impressions of your content, as well as spread the myth of the shadow bath!

Most interesting:

- Most importantly, there is no “shadow ban”. And the presence of this legend is explained by the fact that the majority of subscribers do not see what you publish, because the majority view less than half of their feed.

- The more a specific reader comments on you and saves your posts, the more often your content will be broadcast to them.

- Communication with the audience in Direct greatly affects the reach of your content in general (That is, the more interaction with other users an account has in the last month, the more it will be shown to everyone else)

- The more time a user spends looking at your Stories, the more often they will see the following.

P.S. As stated at the beginning of this article, there is a whole series of materials ahead of us dedicated to the work of Instagram algorithms (I think there will be something interesting)

Today we are announcing an update to the Messenger API to include support for Instagram messaging.

Companies will get new tools for large-scale customer communication management through Instagram. The new APIs allow businesses to integrate Instagram messaging into their business applications and workflows to improve service quality, customer satisfaction, and sales.

The updated API is in beta testing and is available to a limited number of development partners and companies.

A little more than a month ago, the social network decided what to do with likes and how to hide them, all this time it was undergoing a global test, and yesterday they officially announced the launch of a new function all over the world and for everyone.

What do you need to know about the new feature?

Now for each old and new post, you can turn off / turn on the display of likes for other people. For example, if you do not want your subscribers and other users to see the exact number of likes and views under your posts, you can use this function.

How to do it?

For new posts: when publishing a new post, at the last stage go to "Advanced settings" and switch the "Hide the number of likes and views in this post" slider to the active position.

For older posts: on any old post, click on the three dots in the upper right corner and select Hide Likes.

Now, in the privacy settings, you can disable / enable the display of likes for all posts that you view from other people. For example, if you don't care how many likes and views people have and want to focus only on content and communication, you can use this item in the settings.

Or, you can leave everything as it is, then nothing will change for you, it will work as before. Likes and views will remain in place.