Marketers overspend on Facebook News Feed, underspend on Instagram, study says

Brief:

More than 60% of ad spending on Facebook's apps is dedicated to its News Feed despite increased spending on sister app Instagram, per a study that social media marketing platform Socialbakers shared with Mobile Marketer. The firm recommends spreading out media spending on Instagram's various ad formats to boost engagement and enhance influencer marketing programs.
Walmart received 1,507 mentions from 606 influencers on Instagram, making the discount chain the most-mentioned brand during Q2, ahead of Daniel Wellington, iDeal of Sweden, Sephora, Kroger and Fabletics. Heineken Italia, Credit Karma, Sprint Latino, Nature’s Recipe, Puffy and Tre Italia had the best metrics for influencer posts compared with brand posts, per Socialbakers.
Mobile is the most critical platform for brands, with ads seen on mobile devices 95% of the time, compared with only 5% on desktop. The number of Instagram influencers affiliated with brands who made posts using the #Ad hashtag increased by 33% in Q2 from a year earlier, per Socialbakers.

Insight:

Media spending may be over-concentrated on Facebook's News Feed, based on Socialbakers' study of more than 140,000 brand profiles on Facebook and Instagram. While Facebook's News Feed receives more than half of media spending, only 20% goes to the Instagram Feed while about 10% is spread among Instagram Stories, Facebook Suggested Video and Facebook Instream Video. About 30% of media spending goes to non-performing content that earns a "C" or "D" for quality, as determined by Socialbakers. This suggests that marketers would be better off shifting ad spend from Facebook to Instagram.

As for ad metrics, the firm found that cost per click (CPC) on Facebook reached a high of 15 cents last year before a seasonal dip near the holiday season and a bounce back to 14 cents during the first half of the year. The click-through rate for brands fell from 1.6% at the beginning of the year to a current rate of 1.1%, indicating that brands need to improve their targeting on Facebook, per Socialbakers.

The top 50 brands on Instagram now have the same audience size as the top 50 brands on Facebook, as measured by their business profiles, but see higher engagement on Instagram. Instagram interactions have remained steady in the past year, while interactions for Facebook posts fell 3.3%, per Socialbakers. This is more evidence that Instagram should have a bigger share of digital ad spend compared to Facebook.

The firm recommended that brands consider using Instagram Carousel and Facebook Live to boost interactions. Instagram's Carousel format, which shows a series of images by swiping sideways on a smartphone screen, is the leading format for organic interactions at more than 120 per post, per Socialbakers' analysis of about 50,000 brand profiles. However, Carousel is used only 15%-18% of the time by brands. Facebook Live, the social network’s livestreaming platform, leads in interactions, but is utilized in only 4% of posts. By using more popular formats, brands can avoid wasting resources on posts that won’t resonate with their audiences, according to Socialbakers.