At the end of 2019, Reels on Instagram was launched in Brazil and in July 2021, the Reels service appeared on Russian Instagram, which everyone considers a competitor to TikTok. How can innovation be useful, and how can brands promote themselves with it?
Reels – what is this tool
Instagram Reels (called “reels” or “reels” in Russian) is a service for creating and processing videos. The function was introduced by the social network in August last year, but was not available in Russia before. Now, since July of this year, Russian brands can also promote themselves and their products using the new format.
Instagram allows you to create very short vertical videos (releases) no longer than 30 seconds.
Reels Features
The service allows you to publish videos, both shot by users themselves, and edited from other videos. This can be a single video or a series of clips, the total duration of which should also not exceed 30 seconds.
When recording a Reels on Instagram, a tool menu appears on the left with various icons. For example, you can search for a specific piece of music or part of it, change the playback speed of video and audio, add various camera effects (there are not many of them yet, but they are).
Reels has a timer, thanks to which you can record videos automatically. After pressing the button, the countdown to the start of recording starts.
You can also choose the length of the clip and view your previous clip.
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How to make Reels on Instagram and how to publish them?
Videos can be published in the format of stories or posts. To create reels on Instagram, you need to go to the Instagram application, click on a separate tab in the center of the navigation bar with a video icon. The Reels tab will open, after which you can click on the camera icon and start recording.
The publication can be done as a regular post or put in a special section for videos. Reels on Instagram will be visible not only in their own tab, but also in the profile and feed of publications. In addition, the social network inserts them into recommendations. If necessary, reels can be added to stories. The user himself chooses who will see his videos – only to subscribers or to everyone. If the videos are public, they will appear in the Explore recommendation feed.
When choosing audio accompaniment, you can use melodies and their parts from the library, record your own music or take other users’ music, if their settings allow it. You can mix your music with other music from your library or from specific people on Instagram. It is noteworthy that a silent video cannot be made – and if the creator of the video absolutely needs it to be without sound, he must find a recording of silence in the library and insert it into the video.
When choosing musical accompaniment, it is recommended to use only licensed recordings. You also need to remember that reels, if they are 1920 pixels, are cut off to 1350 pixels in the feed.
Re-uploads from TikTok are not approved by the social network, which is expressed in the pessimization of impressions, the deterioration of the quality of the video, or its complete hiding from the public.
How Reels on Instagram can help brands
As with any video, the main feature of reels is dynamism. In this case, you can shoot anything. For example, manufacturers can create videos with the stages of product manufacturing, transport companies with loading and unloading goods, retail chains with customers in stores.
The main conditions here are common for all social networks – interesting content, high-quality design and regularity of publications.
For example, at fashion house Louis Vuitton, all videos go viral and collect an average of about 7 million views, and one of the Red Bull France videos received more than 2.4 million views.
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