Skift Take
With the addition of reservations for advertisers, Instagram will reach customers as they're most engaged, offering convenient booking and instant ROI for businesses.
Editor's Note: In September we announced that Skift was expanding into food and drink with the addition of the Chefs+Tech weekly newsletter.
We see this as a natural expansion of the Skift umbrella, bringing the big picture view on the future of dining out, being fanatically focused on the guest experience, and at the intersection of marketing and tech.
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Book Your Reservation on Instagram (Soon.)
Who would have guessed that a social network for photos would become a powerful business tool? Instagram’s product offerings for advertisers is expanding, and will soon include the ability for users to book with a business directly through an Instagram post. The feature, announced last week, is available only to businesses that advertise on the platform, of which Instagram says it has one million active monthly. Additionally, 80 percent of Instagram users follow a business, making this new feature potentially game-changing.
While some are billing this as “competition for OpenTable” or “copying Yelp,” Instagram is literally catering to customers where they are. As it stands now, the user sees the image, then interacts with the image via a like or a comment. The ability to actually interact with that business in a transactional way (through an appointment or reservation) means that a restaurant can see nearly immediate return on its social media advertising investment — and ROI on social can be tricky to prove.
