Instagram is taking a ‘mix and match’ approach to money-making tools for video makers

In this week's Future of TV Briefing, available exclusively to Digiday+ members, senior media editor Tim Peterson looks at how Instagram’s all-in-one video product strategy is now being reflected in its wide-ranging monetization plans for video makers.

This week’s Media Briefing, another member exclusive, looks at how issues like diversity, equity and inclusion and office return statuses are factoring into media companies’ ability to hire people.

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Future of TV Briefing: Instagram is taking a ‘mix and match’ approach to money-making tools for video makers

By Tim Peterson

Instagram, the all-inclusive digital video platform

As a digital video platform, Instagram has not necessarily carved out a niche among video publishers and individual video creators. But that may be becoming more of a feature than a bug.

YouTube is currently most closely associated with more produced, longer-length videos. Snapchat is the spot for short-form shows and ephemeral stories. And TikTok is the hotbed for the shortest of entertainments. Meanwhile, Instagram has emerged as a home to all of the above. 

“Instagram is still figuring out how to best curate that content, but they are the best at giving all of the resources to the individual,” said Chris Sawtelle, head of digital ventures at talent agency ICM Partners.

At the same time, Instagram is increasingly developing the means of giving video makers one of the most important resources of all: money. While publishers and creators are able to sell sponsorships against their Instagram accounts, the platform has been slow to provide direct means for them to make money. 

That’s changing, though. But even as it does, the Facebook-owned company is adopting a kitchen sink strategy. Rather than solely stand up a long-expected advertising revenue-sharing program, Instagram is also stretching into commerce and even dangling the possibility of audience-payment products.

The key hits: 

• Instagram’s video platform spans Reels, IGTV, Stories, live video and in-feed video posts.
• That breadth contrasts with other platforms that have established specialties.
• However, the scope of Instagram’s video product portfolio and size of its audience have opened it up to different kinds of publishers and creators.
• Instagram is now taking a similar wide-ranging approach to rolling out revenue-generating products for video makers.

What we've heard

“With the social platforms, given how businesses have been crushed in the past, to me it’s just grab [the viewership and revenue] while you can because they can eat us up and toss us out next year.”

— Entertainment executive

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Media Briefing: How media companies’ DE&I efforts, office return statuses are affecting hiring

By Tim Peterson

The future of hiring

As the media business continues to rebound from the pandemic and companies begin to ramp up hiring, two of the biggest topics in the media business from the past year — diversity, equity and inclusion and the shift to remote work — are playing a role in some companies’ abilities to hire people.

The key hits:

• Candidates are turning down job offers because of companies’ DE&I track records, according to people working in the media industry.
• In other cases, they are passing on positions because of companies’ office return plans, including because companies have no plans to return to an office.
• The extent to which job candidates are taking into account companies’ DE&I efforts and office return plans could complicate media companies’ efforts to rebuild their workforces after a year in which many organizations laid off employees in an effort to cut costs and weather the pandemic’s impact on their businesses.

Media companies have announced 725 new hiring plans this year, up from 12 at this point in 2020, according to data from executive outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc. that was cited by Axios. A Challenger, Gray & Christmas spokesperson confirmed the figure and said it refers to the number of people that media companies have announced they plan to hire.

DE&I dealbreakers

Hiring has been one way in which media companies have been pressed to address the lack of diversity, equity and inclusion within their organizations. But that pressure is being expressed in different ways beyond employees calling for their employers to hire more people from underrepresented groups. A company failing to adequately address its DE&I shortcomings can see it having a compounding effect on its hiring efforts.

One media company that has been publicly scrutinized for its lack of diversity has seen it happen this year. “There was someone that turned down a job because of the DE&I stuff,” said an employee at the company.

What we've heard

“We formed a diversity and inclusion committee, and they do research and inform the company. But I’m wondering, where are our practices? Let’s stop sharing articles. All of this is important, and it’s good to share and have that dialogue, but there’s a lack of information about what companies are doing.”

— Media executive

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Further reading

• Cheat Sheet: How Shopify’s one-click checkout expansion could help Facebook, Google compete with Amazon
  As Google and Facebook race to build e-commerce market share, they’ve partnered with a payments provider that’s built an unexpectedly solid base of consumer trust.

• The TV upfront marketplace is moving along at breakneck speed, and eye-popping ad-rate increases
  The 2021-22 TV upfront marketplace is close to wrapping up initial negotiations, said several media buyers. It’s arguably the strongest seller’s market in modern memory, for several reasons.

• Amazon is blocking Google’s FLoC — and that could seriously weaken the fledgling tracking system
  Amazon is blocking Google’s controversial cookieless tracking and targeting method, a significant blow to Google’s mission to guide the future of digital ad tracking after cookies die.

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