Major Brands Zoom In On Instagram

In case the name Instagram doesn’t ring a bell, here is a brief introduction: it is photo-sharing mobile platform that joined the social media club in October 2010 and was recently snatched up by Facebook for the tidy sum of $1 billion. More pertinent to us marketers are the findings of a study showing that the relatively young service has been embraced by 40% of the companies featuring on the Interbrand 100 list, meaning the 100 most valuable brands on the planet.

The study that established this was conducted by social media analytics firm Simply Measured, which announced the results in a posting on its blog. While 40% may not seem like much compared to the figures for other social media outlets, Simply Measured considers the result impressive given Instagram’s tender age, its exclusive focus on photo sharing and its mobile-only network. The current leader is Facebook with 98% of the top 100 brands active on its platform. Twitter comes second with 94%, Google+ is next with 64% and Pinterest is used by 51%.

Instagram currently has 80 million users and Simply Measured said it expects this number to reach 100 million before the service turns two years old, noting that Facebook and Twitter reached that threshold in their fourth and fifth year, respectively.

The study has revealed that the 40 brands active on Instagram have a combined three million users although 96% of those are followers of the top 10 brands. Music channel MTV leads the rankings with slightly more than 813,000 fans, coffee chain Starbucks is next with a little over 758,000 and luxury fashion brand Burberry rounds off the top three with about 454,000 followers.