IGTV is the New Trend in 2018?

*Drums playing loudly and people clapping and cheering*

Because Instagram’s brand new video platform is here! IGTV is a place for long duration videos which is available in the native Instagram app and the standalone IGTV app. Here are 3 things you need to know about IGTV also we are going to answer a lot of questions that pop in people’s mind when they encounter with IGTV.

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What is IGTV:

IGTV is Instagram’s way of breaking the traditional idea of tv experience and updating it to a modern, mobile experience. Youtube’s popularity has exploded over the years and because of mobile videos the percentage of people seeing tv has decreased by 40%.

By 2021 mobile videos are going to be the reason for 78% mobile data traffic. Instagram is emphasizing this idea by the launch of IGTV.

Anyone on Instagram can create their own IGTV channel and share their long-form videos with their followers.

For now, videos can be 10 minutes for most accounts and up to 1 hour for large accounts with millions of followers. But eventually, there will be no time limit.

IGTV is all about vertical videos which makes sense for a mobile-only platform. Also, it makes it very easy because everyone is accustomed to vertical videos already through Instagram stories.

You can watch IGTV videos in the Instagram app and whenever someone you follow posts a video you can just click on the icon and see it. Instagram kind of shows you the videos based on the persons you follow or the kind of videos you seem to like. You can also see watch most trending videos on the “Popular channel”. Also just like Instagram stories you can share IGTV videos with your friends directly through Instagram.

As the CEO of Instagram Kevin Systrom said right now there are no ads. They are currently working on building audience engagement. But obviously, there will be a way for the creators to make a living.

Some Important notes about IGTV:

IGTV is all about vertical videos as said before so you need to keep that in mind while shooting a video. You have to shoot different videos for uploading on different social media channels or you need to be able to crop the video vertically. It includes a lot of editing skills so you need to learn like right now if you don’t know how to.

Even though you can upload videos on it more than 1 hour long it will be nothing like Netflix. So don’t expect to see your favorite TV shows here anytime soon. IGTV is more like for following your favorite influencer and vlogger. Instagram is kind of mixing it up by taking ideas from snapchat and YouTube.

Instagram is focusing on web and Instagram influencers who already have a nice amount of audience or the persons who want to use Instagram as their platform. Also, you don’t need super polished and professional videos to upload on IGTV. You can just start by making it appear a bit better than your straight off Instagram stories.

Instagram is trying to give their viewers a traditional TV experience on mobile. Everyone can have their own channels and you can watch what you want. There is no fuss about possessing the remote cause it is like an individual TV for everyone owning a mobile phone. You can also comment or like a video you are watching.

Right now there are 3 IGTV categories:

·           “FOR YOU” is the videos that Instagram thinks you will like based on the people you follow and Instagram’s statistical learning.

·           “FOLLOWING” is a collection of videos from all the people that are on your following list. So if someone is following you means they have access to your videos.

·           “POPULAR” features all the videos that are trending and ranked by popularity.

Lastly, the thing you need to know is you can have only “ONE” IGTV channel. Because according to Instagram “the creators are the soul of their channels”.​

Let me know in the comments that have you used IGTV yet and how’s your experiences?


-         Joyeta Banerjee & Dick Polipnick
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