The Instagram redesign you need to know

This new change brings Reels and Shop tabs up front on the Home Screen and the Likes and Create tabs moving up next to the direct messages inbox. That’s right, the Reels and Shop tabs have been given prominent space up front in the Instagram app.

“We don’t take these changes lightly – we haven’t updated Instagram’s home screen in a big way for quite a while,” head of Instagram Adam Mosseri wrote in a blog post. “But how people create and enjoy culture has changed, and the biggest risk to Instagram is not that we change too fast, but that we don’t change and become irrelevant. We’re excited about the new design and believe it gives the app a much-needed refresh, while staying true to our core value of simplicity.”

– Instagram

This is why it’s a big deal. This is why it’s worth your attention. Let’s look at these in a little more detail.

Instagram (and Facebook) have been working on its Shops product for some time now and launched it earlier this summer. Shops provides a dedicated page for you to list products and either link out to your e-commerce store or handle a transaction directly within Instagram/Facebook. You can even connect your ecommerce system (Shopify, BigCommerce, CommerceHub, Feedonomics, …) automatically update products in to Facebook/Instagram shops and reduce a huge amount of setup and admin.

Shops is a big deal. Having the ability to reach customers, showcase a product and convert that attention into a sale is the holy grail of social commerce.

Note: Shops is now on the Home Screen of Instagram!

Reel is Instagrams answer to TikTok, a way of creating short, entertaining videos on Instagram and pull the TikTok generation back to Instagram. Having only been launched back in August, Reels being promoted to the Home Screen of the Instagram app strong signal. IGTV, Instagrams *long form* video feature was launched back in 2018, but has never featured as prominently. This is a clear signal that short, entertaining video on instagram is very much here to stay!

Note: Reels is now on the Home Screen of Instagram!

Many “social media experts” will try and tell you the secrets to win on Instagram. Some advice can be really helpful but a lot of it is just generalised behaviours, hard work and consistency. This announcement and change from Instagram is something completely different – Instagram themselves have just told you where to focus your efforts in the year ahead!

Go create!