Instagram is Testing Unskippable Ads: What This "Instagram Ad Break" Could Mean for Users and Advertisers
Jourdan Aldredge
Jul 16, 2024
While we all know that Facebook has been the biggest, and largely the most successful, social media platform over the past decade, most are aware that its popularity is waning. In its place are newer, younger-focused social apps like Instagram and TikTok which are very much still growing in popularity.
And while Instagram might admittedly be owned by Facebook still, it’s a good example of what the future of social media apps might look like today—and tomorrow as the platform continues to evolve and try out new things.
However, change isn’t always a good thing, and with reports of Instagram possibly trying out unskippable ads on the app, let’s take a quick look at what this could mean for content creators hoping to use Instagram to promote their own products or grow their own brands.
According to reports from The Verge, unskippable ads are already being tested on Instagram and a spokesperson for the company has confirmed as much too. And while this might seem like the natural order of things for a growing social media company, it’s already getting some sharp backlash from users.
This is, of course, just in the testing phase right now, so chances are that if you check Instagram yourself right now, you probably won’t see any of these unskippable ad breaks when using the app for scrolling your feed or watching Stories or Reels.
Yet, as the reports indicate, these “Instagram Ad break” ads that have popped up on Instagram’s feed do appear to be quite hard to miss when they are enabled. Which, depending on your viewpoint as either an advertiser or a casual user, could be a good or a bad thing.
Regardless, though, if you are looking to create advertising content for Instagram and other social media apps, you never want your content to appear in a way that is too annoying or off-putting to users. This puts your ads in a bad light and creates a negative connotation with your brand.
That being said, because Instagram is so popular and because the company is open to at least experimenting with new ways to serve ads, Instagram is still one of the best places to advertise products and services directly to interested users.
If you’d like to learn more about how to advertise on social media platforms like Instagram, here are some helpful tips for how to avoid copyright infringement in marketing campaigns, as well as a full resource of music for social creators.
Also, as a royalty free music licensing company ourselves, we’ve done quite a bit of research into what the best social media apps are for video and content creation in general. We have lots of tips to share about how to best position your content on social media apps like Instagram, as well as curated playlists exploring the best royalty free music and sound effects for all of the popular social media channels.
Here are some resources we’d recommend checking out if you are interested in creating videos for Instagram or other platforms.
Regardless of your thoughts on Instagram in general, or this new experiment in unskippable ads, our advice for the future would pretty much be the same. Don’t limit yourself to just one platform or one means of building your personal or company’s brand.
Instagram is a great place to advertise and grow a channel, of course, but it might not always be that way. Unskippable ads might become a thing and work great, or they might drive users away and toward the next new thing. You never know with this topsy-turvy industry.
At the end of the day, Instagram’s advertising formats are something you simply can’t control. What you can control, though, are your own ads and video, as well as the overall quality of your content. If you focus on providing engaging, helpful, and emphatic content for your brands’ channels, you’ll always be in the best position to succeed.
