Instagram is the third-largest social media site.
Moreover, its parent company Meta also owns two of the other four platforms that appear in the top five: Facebook and WhatsApp.
So, you might think the team at Instagram would be pretty content with how things are going.
But you’d be wrong. Over the past five years, TikTok has stolen a huge chunk of Insta’s market share.
That goes a long way to explaining the 2020 launch of Instagram Reels.
What Are Instagram Reels?
If Instagram Stories were a straight copy of Snapchat, then Instagram Reels would be an effort to replicate TikTok. In other words, it’s a short-form video platform within the Instagram app.
With Reels, you can create and edit short (up to 90-second) videos, add music and effects, and then share them with your followers and the wider Instagram community (provided you’ve got a public account).
You can also post longer videos of up to 15 minutes in length — you just have to record them outside Instagram and then upload them.
As a quick aside, it’s worth pointing out that Reels isn’t Meta’s first TikTok-inspired rodeo. They rolled out the ill-fated Lasso in late 2018, only to kill it off in July 2020 due to a lack of uptake.
Clearly, Meta hoped it would enjoy better results by attaching Reels to an already popular platform. And it seems to be working, given that over half of Insta users interact with Reels by liking, commenting, or sharing at least once a week.
How to Create Instagram Reels
If you’re familiar with TikTok, Instagram Reels will be second nature.
First off, bear in mind that Reels are mobile-only. That means you can only create and share them from a mobile device or a scheduling tool that incorporates this feature. You can’t create Reels using the Instagram web app.
To get started, navigate to the dedicated Reels button within the Instagram mobile app:
Once there, you’ll see the following tools on the left-hand side of your screen:
- Audio: Browse the Instagram music library or add your own audio. When you include your original music, it’ll be attributed to you – and if your account is public, other users can include it in their own Reels.
- Effects: Add AR effects created by Instagram’s in-house team and third-party creators.
- Layout: Choose one of six grid options, including horizontal and vertical split-screen layouts.
- Green Screen: Use Instagram’s built-in green screen filter to add your own backdrop.
- Add Yours: A sticker that encourages your followers to join the conversation by sharing their own video response to your Reel.
- Length: Set the maximum length of your Reel. Choose 15, 30, 60, or 90 seconds.
- Dual: Display video from your front- and rear-facing cameras in the same Reel.
- Gesture Control: This helpful feature lets you start and stop recording by raising your hand.
As well as recording Reels within the app, you can use the tool to edit and share uploaded videos from your gallery.
How To Edit and Share Instagram Reels
Recorded your first Reel? Congratulations! Now, it’s time to let the world celebrate your masterpiece.
But first, Instagram gives you a ton of editing options to help you hone your content. We’ll walk you through the steps here:
1. Choose Audio and Play Speed
You can choose a soundtrack for your Reel and set your desired play speed. It can be as slow as 0.3x or as fast as 4x the original recording.
When you’re done, tap Next in the upper-right corner.
2. Add Music and Effects
On the next screen, Instagram gives you more options to customize your Reel. Tapping one of those icons at the top of the screen allows you to:
- Save your Reel as a draft
- Choose background music
- Add filters and special effects
- Add more images or videos to your Reel
- Add stickers (including polls, closed captions, and your location)
- Add text
Also, do you notice that Edit video button nestled in the bottom left corner?
Tapping it brings up the Reels video editor, where you can add audio and captions to specific sections of your video:
For instance, you can add a text box that pops up on the three-second mark and disappears after six seconds.
Again, when you’re finished with this screen, tap Next.
3. Add a Cover Image and Caption
Now it’s time to add two key elements that affect the reach and engagement of your Reel: your cover image and caption.
Instagram Reels Cover
Think of your cover image as an ad for your Reel, just like the thumbnail image on YouTube.
Provided you choose to share your Reel to your Instagram profile grid, the cover photo will show up alongside all your standard image posts, just like these examples from menswear brand Bonobos:
Instagram automatically displays the first frame of your Reel as your cover image, which might not be the most engaging part of your video. So, it pays to create a custom cover that showcases the content of your Reel and gives people browsing your grid a reason to click. Plus, you’ll want to choose a cover that fits the overall vibe of your grid.
Before you start creating your cover image, there are three key points to bear in mind:
- Use a compatible file format: Cover photos must be a jpg or png.
- Choose the right image size: Instagram recommends a cover image size of 420 px by 654 px or an aspect ratio of 1:1.55.
- Get it right the first time: Currently, Instagram doesn’t allow you to edit a cover photo after you’ve uploaded it, so make sure you’re happy with it before sharing your Reel.
Instagram Reels Caption
Like any type of Instagram post, you can write captions of up to 2,200 characters (including hashtags).
So you should feel free to flex your literary muscles and type as much as you want, right?
Not necessarily. An (admittedly small-scale) experiment from Hootsuite revealed that Reels with shorter captions see slightly higher reach — and far higher engagement — than those with longer captions. So, it seems fewer words are the way to go.
Next, let’s talk hashtags to help your Reels reach a wider audience.
You can add a maximum of 30 hashtags to your Reels. Use any more, and your comment will not be posted.
4. Finalize and Share
When you scroll down from the cover photo and caption sections, you’ll see a bunch of other options related to the appearance, functionality, and publication of your Reel. It looks like this:
Use these options to perform a wide range of tasks. For instance, you can:
- Save your Reel as a draft to re-edit or share later
- Tag friends or collaborators
- Tag products that appear in your Reel — invaluable for e-commerce brands
- Choose who you want to share your Reel with — everyone or just your close friends
- Add a message button so people can contact you directly from your Reel
Finally, when you’re satisfied with your editing efforts, hit the blue Share button to broadcast your Reel to your desired audience.
Easy, huh?
👉 Learn more: Level up your Reels with our article: 24 Instagram Hacks and When to Use Them
Technical Considerations for Creating Instagram Reels
Okay, so that’s the basics of creating and sharing Instagram Reels.
But if you use Reels in your Instagram marketing strategy, your content needs to look on point. That means you need to familiarize yourself with all the key tech specs.
Here are a few helpful pointers:
- Nail the technical elements. Instagram Reels are intended to display in full 9:16 portrait mode, like Instagram Stories. However, when they appear in the newsfeed, they’re shrunk to 4:5, cropping the top and bottom 15% of your video. Reels also have a minimum frame rate of 30 frames per second.
- Know your lengths. When Reels first launched, they were limited to 15 seconds, but they can now be up to 90 seconds (or even longer if you create them outside the app).
- Don’t slip up on cover photos. The same cover image can appear in your grid (at 1:1 ratio) and within the Reels gallery (at 9:16). You don’t need to be a mathematician to know those are two very different ratios. Focus your key content on the middle of the image to make sure your thumbnail works across both.
3 Ways to Use Reels in Your Instagram Marketing Strategy
Now we’ve got all the theory out the way, let’s consider how you can incorporate Reels into your existing Instagram marketing strategy. Here are three practical examples of how to use Reels on Instagram:
1. Showcase Your Brand Personality
Social media has always been a fantastic way for brands to demonstrate their personality. Why? Because social platforms are typically informal spaces. If you’re going to thrive on social, you can’t get away with bland business talk.
Video can help you demonstrate your personality. Moreover, the highly immersive nature of the Reels tab – where videos take up the whole screen – offers brands lots of scope to communicate who they are and what they stand for in an engaging, impactful way.
Example: Red Bull
Red Bull certainly isn’t short on personality. The brand understands its core audience comprises people who love outdoor and extreme sports, and that’s precisely what it offers on Reels. This approach works because Red Bull’s Reels regularly notch up tens of millions of views:
View this post on Instagram
2. Offer Something Exclusive
There’s no point using Reels in your Instagram marketing strategy if you post the same content in a slightly different format.
Instead, treat Reels as a unique platform, much like you would with TikTok. Give your audience a real reason to seek out your Reels, and try to adopt a style and content themes different enough from your regular Instagram activity to stand alone.
Example: Balmain
As a luxury fashion house, Balmain’s Instagram presence is distinctly high-end, with a grid full of catwalk clips, stylish new products, and high-concept creative imagery. By contrast, their Reels are a little less formal, often giving audiences a close-up view of what it’s like to attend a Balmain event:
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3. Demonstrating Your Products
Sure, social media isn’t meant to be all sell, sell, sell. However, with the growing popularity of social commerce, more and more brands are using platforms like Instagram to showcase their products and drive sales.
Example: Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton’s official Instagram account has more than 43 million followers, and a high proportion of its audience engages with its Reels. Importantly, Louis Vuitton isn’t reinventing the wheel here — they simply showcase the brand’s latest products. A time of writing, this includes highlights from their latest summer collection:
View this post on Instagram
👉 Learn more: Get more inspiration in our roundup: 20 of the Best Examples of Brands Using Instagram Reels.
Instagram Reels vs. TikTok: Which Is Best for You?
We’ve mentioned the “T” word several times in this article, so now it’s time to address the elephant in the room. If you’re only going to use one of TikTok or Instagram Reels, which should it be?
To help you answer that all-important question, we’ve weighed up the relative merits of the two platforms:
- Users: Instagram currently has about half a million more active users monthly than TikTok, so you can theoretically reach a wider audience through Instagram.
- Demographics: Everyone knows TikTok’s audience skews younger, with over three-quarters of 18 to 24-year-olds in the US using the platform. Instagram is a little older, with roughly two-thirds of users aged 25+.
- Video length: Instagram Reels lets you create and share longer videos, with an upper limit of 90 seconds — or 15 minutes for videos created externally. By contrast, TikTok has a maximum length of 60 seconds for videos made in the app and three minutes for external videos.
- Functionality: There’s very little to choose between the two platforms regarding functionality, with both platforms offering a vast range of creative tools. However, with Reels, you can leverage more channels to reach your audience by sharing your Reels to your grid and Instagram Stories.
- Engagement: There are so many figures on engagement rates that making a direct comparison is challenging. However, one study claimed Reels achieved an average engagement rate of 1.48%, while another found the average rate on TikTok is 2.65% by follower count and 4.07% by views. So TikTok has a clear edge here.
From our perspective, if you have the resources, you should use both TikTok and Instagram Reels.
But if you can only choose one, your audience should inform your decision. If you already have a ton of followers on Instagram, it makes sense to use Reels rather than TikTok (and vice versa).
Want to learn more about using different social media platforms to boost your brand awareness and build stronger audience relationships? Check out one of our upcoming social media strategy conferences.
