Dive Brief:
- Instagram is seeing increasing engagement for Super Bowl posts from brands, Adweek reported, citing an analysis by social marketing firm Unmetric of U.S. brands’ Super Bowl-related activity on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram from 2012 to 2018.
- Facebook has been the preferred social network for posting Super Bowl-related content, but it has seen declining popularity since 2015 with brands shifting to Instagram. Over the past year, posts on Instagram had 2x more interactions than Facebook and 11x more than Twitter. Of the 100 most engaging brand Super Bowl posts in 2018, Instagram posts with images garnered 4x more interactions than Facebook posts and 79x more than tweets.
- Digital conversations around the Super Bowl were dominated by the hospitality industry, which published 869 posts on Facebook. Marriott Rewards had one of the most engaging posts with a giveaway of 500 points. Food and beverage and retail brands followed closely behind with the number of posts.
Dive Insight:
With the Super Bowl just under a month away, marketers should take note of the findings of the Unmetric analysis as they prepare to roll out their campaigns around the big game. Most Super Bowl social media posts from brands run from mid-January to early February, but some begin campaigns in September with posts focusing on giveaways.
Even though most social media content is posted on Facebook, Instagram sees much higher engagement levels. Super Bowl advertisers tend to experience benefits for months after the game, and investing more on Instagram campaigns could further expand brand reach and deepen the emotional connection with consumers. Instagram is the preferred platform for younger consumers, and others are limiting their Facebook use, following several privacy issues on the platform over the past year.
Marketers are seeing the benefits that Instagram can offer and shifting their budgets to the platform. For the recent holiday season, Instagram and Instagram Stories were a key part of brands’ strategies, as they hoped to target mobile users. Instagram has been ramping up its ad products to attract more advertisers. The platform recently expanded its Shopping tool to Instagram Stories, allowing users to pause stories and get more details and images about products and a link to a brand’s site to make a purchase. More than one-third of Instagram Stories users say they’re more interested in products or brands after seeing it on Stories, according to the company.