Instagram Ads API Partner Program Launches

When Instagram announced in June that it would introduce call-to-action buttons, it also mentioned that it would open the Instagram Ads API. That day has come. The Instagram Ads API Partner program launched Tuesday, with launch partners including: Ampush Brand Networks 4C Kenshoo Nanigans Salesforce Marketing Cloud SocialCode Unified Instagram Ads API Partners will be able to perform tasks including scheduling and publishing content to the Facebook-owned photo- and video-sharing network, monitoring audiences and sharing access to Instagram accounts across teams. Instagram did not make any formal announcement about its application-programming interface, saying in an email to SocialTimes: Instagram ads will be available to advertisers of all types later this year. We are currently testing self-serve buying interfaces and APIs with a small group of partners, and we expect to make them more widely available over the coming months. Ampush CEO Jesse Pujji broke down what this means for clients in a press release: Instagram is the mobile marketer’s platform of choice for a highly engaged and growing audience. It presents a great opportunity to deliver in-feed, mobile advertising at true scale with its user base of over 300 million monthly active users. AMP’s integration with Instagram will allow our customers to advertise across a visually dynamic environment for consumers with a highly active community. Our strategic and in-house creative expertise, paired with our marketing solutions, delivers a unique ability to bridge audience engagement with revenue. Kenshoo senior vp of product Will Martin-Gill said in a release: Clients that have launched Instagram ads through Kenshoo are achieving average click-through rates higher than second-quarter-2015 industry averages for social advertising. When coupled with Kenshoo’s innovative suite of targeting and optimization tools, brands advertising on Instagram have the potential to exponentially improve results for their entire campaign portfolio. Salesforce Marketing Cloud CEO Scott McCorkle commented on the news to SocialTimes: When Instagram initially launched its direct advertising offering in 2013, its user community was 150 million strong. By June 2015, that community had grown to over 300 million globally. According to a recent report from eMarketer, Instagram is expected to represent over 10 percent of Facebook’s global revenues by 2017, including 28 percent of all U.S. mobile revenues. Today, we are excited to announce that the Salesforce is offering a whole new set of tools for marketers to engage with customers on Instagram across our suite of Marketing Cloud products: Social.com for managing advertising campaigns at scale; Active Audiences to unlock and sync customer-relationship-management data in Salesforce to optimize advertising; and Social Studio for publishing, engagement, customer service and analytics. Unified chief product officer Jason Beckerman said in an email to SocialTimes: Instagram presents an incredible opportunity to marketers—the ability to present compelling visual and video content in a community of 300 million incredibly engaged users. I’ve not seen anything this powerful since the launch of the original Facebook advertising API in 2011, which has since driven substantial success and revenue for some of the world’s biggest brands. Jamie Tedford, co-founder and CEO of Brand Networks, was excited about the program, telling SocialTimes: Advertisers have been eagerly awaiting the chance to bring their content to Instagram. Now, Instagram is bringing on experienced Facebook Marketing Partners to help brands use the same advanced Facebook targeting tools to create and deliver relevance-driven ad campaigns that increase return on investment by reaching the right audience, at the right place and time. This is one the most anticipated moments in the evolution of advertising, and we expect the platform’s offering will continue to expand rapidly. SocialCode co-founder and CEO Laura O’Shaughnessy said in an email to SocialTimes: Brands are eagerly anticipating the expansion of advertising on Instagram. The platform’s rich experience and extensive reach with younger audiences makes it a perfect environment to influence and inspire, and to offer consumers relevant opportunities to purchase products. We look forward to continuing to build on Instagram’s Ads API and to guiding our clients’ success with new capabilities as they’re introduced. Nanigans co-founder and CEO Ric Calvillo said in an email to SocialTimes: We’ve seen growing demand from both current and prospective customers to access the Instagram advertising ecosystem programmatically. Instagram has a large and highly engaged global user base, and its latest release to support Facebook targeting and an expanded set of ad types presents a compelling opportunity for our direct-response advertisers. We look forward to helping these performance marketers scale their campaigns and benefit from reaching audiences cross-channel. Kenshoo's senior vice president of product, Will Martin-Gill, weighed in on the news: Clients that have launched Instagram ads through Kenshoo are achieving average click-through rates higher than Q2 2015 industry averages for social advertising. When coupled with Kenshoo’s innovative suite of targeting and optimization tools, and brands advertising on Instagram have the potential to exponentially improve results for their entire campaign portfolio. Readers: What are your initial thoughts on the Instagram Ads API? Justin Lafferty contributed to this story. Image courtesy of 2nix Studio/Shutterstock.com.

Social Pro Daily

Instagram Ads API Partner Program Launches

When Instagram announced in June that it would introduce call-to-action buttons, it also mentioned that it would open the Instagram Ads API. That day has come.

David Cohen

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