Instagram will do just fine without Twitter

Twitter and Instagram have been uneasy bedfellows since the latter was acquired by Facebook. But before that they were well, mates. Instagram gained a following by having its users import contacts from Facebook and Twitter and then share content via those two social networks as well as on its own platform, making it an add-on to the other two more mature social networks.

So does Instagram have what it takes to go it alone?

Social media experts say, “yes”.

“Instagram is a platform unto itself, and it has enough loyal participants to keep it going without Twitter's help,” said We Are Social managing director, Simon Kemp. “I think it still has plenty of relevance to brands too; we're recommending it more and more recently, so it has potential.”

As a mobile platform it may be even stronger than Twitter, pointed out Winnie Tsui, inside sales manager at Kenshoo. “Instagram’s daily mobile users overtook Twitter’s back in September and it’s now a bigger mobile platform than Twitter.”

According to comScore, Instagram had 7.3 million daily mobile users in August this year while Twitter had 6.9 million. However, in terms of total unique visitors that month, Twitter drew 29 million versus Instagram’s 21 million—which may part of the reason why Instagram is no longer keen to drive visitors to Twitter.

According to Experian, Instagram’s popularity in Asia-Pacific has skyrocketed growing 8121 per cent year on year in Singapore between July 2011 and July 2012. In the same period, growth in Hong Kong was 132 per cent, New Zealand 843 per cent and 362 per cent in Australia.

“What’s interesting about the usage figures is the growth rate month on month,” said Kristen Boschma, general manager, The Social Hatch. “Instagram has experienced extreme growth rates across the region with monthly increases of 13 to 20 per cent, whereas Twitter has remained steady in the October to November period.”

The name of the game, said Boschma, is eyeballs. “Sites want users to go to their site, stay there, look around, share the brand and be loyal to the brand. So basically Instagram is trying to run a successful and profitable business and needs eyeballs on their site and their brand to do it. They want users to stay and play on their site not on Twitter.”

A reason Instagram has offered for this move is that their site allows users to see images in larger sizes. This may seem superficial, but recent online sentiment shows that many users are concerned about picture quality as well as ease of share, she added.

Thanks to its loyal user base and visual timeline, Instagram shouldn’t be too worried about Twitter, Facebook, and now, Flickr adding filters to their photo-taking capabilities. After all, said Freda Kwok, lead consultant at Blugrapes, there are many photo editing apps out in the market. “Unless the filters are going to be extremely unique, there is probably already another application out there that can get the job done. Based on what has been rolled out, though, it is a pretty basic suit of offerings.”

While Twitter’s filters will be handy for big Twitter users, it’s the visual timeline that Twitter should be looking at, said Kemp. “The Instagram experience is still going to be more appealing to those users who are looking for visual stimulation from other people's pictures as much as they are looking to share their own photos.”

Facebook’s decision to include filters highlights its commitment to keep Instagram a separate brand, said Boschma. Even if it means the two platforms wind up competing.

Blugrapes’ Kwok and We Are Social’s Kemp view Facebook’s decision as a “natural progression” of any photo sharing mobile app.

“Facebook needs a more mobile-centric offering, and Instagram was always a mobile platform, so it makes sense for Facebook to learn from Instagram and see how it can improve its mobile 'product',” concluded Kemp.