By Chris Skeldon 
Instagram strives to keep teens on the platform
When Instagram reached 1 billion users in 2018, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg described the app as an “amazing success”. The photo-sharing platform, owned by Facebook, was widely hailed as a huge hit with young people and celebrated as a growth engine for the social network.
But even as Zuckerberg praised Instagram, the app in particular lamented the loss of teenage users of other social media platforms as an “existential threat,” according to a 2018 marketing presentation.
In the past year, the problem has become more pressing, according to internal Instagram documents obtained by The New York Times.
“If we lose teen support in the United States, we will lose the pipeline,” said the October 2020 strategy note outlining a marketing plan for this year.
The platform has invested millions of dollars to attract young people
In the face of this threat, Instagram has acted. As of 2018, the platform had devoted almost the entirety of its annual global marketing budget — estimated at $390 million that year — to reach teens, primarily through digital advertising, according to planning documents and people directly involved in the process.
According to marketers, focusing solely on a limited age group is very unusual, although the final expenses went beyond teenagers and included their parents and young adults.
Instagram documents reveal the company’s anguish and dismay as it struggles behind the scenes to retain, engage and attract young users. Even when Instagram was announced as one of Facebook’s crown jewels, it took extraordinary spending measures to get the attention of teens. He particularly emphasized a category called “early high school,” which he categorized as students between the ages of 13 and 15.
Any Instagram gaffe could have bigger consequences for Facebook. The social network had hoped Instagram would attract more young people to all of its apps, re-feeding Facebook’s aging user base, according to the documents. But the documents also show that Facebook has abandoned its aspirations of becoming a destination for teens, just as Instagram is increasingly debating how to keep its audience small.
In September of last year, an internal Instagram marketing planning document showed that the app increased its daily user count by nearly 24% compared to the previous year, but some metrics related to teens are beginning to decline.
Snapchat was the app of choice for best friends who wanted to exchange messages with each other, and TikTok was fighting YouTube for teens who shared videos.
“In the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, young people are finding the main sharing features of IG to be less fun than before, and having nothing to share now remains a barrier to sharing more,” the document said.
The October 2020 strategy paper, “Instagram Marketing Approach 2021,” pointed out other red flags. A survey of 13-44-year-olds who left Instagram due to competitors showed that people of all ages were using YouTube and TikTok more, with teens more specifically turning to Snapchat.
Network accused of harming teens’ mental health
The disclosure comes amid concerns from Congress and the public about Instagram’s effects on users’ mental health.
Exposed documents
By Frances Hogan, a former Facebook employee, notes that the company was aware that some teens reported feeling bad about their body image when using Instagram. Haugen testified at a Senate hearing
in this month. She said Facebook intentionally keeps people, including children, bound to its services.
Instagram’s fear of losing young users also highlights how much the internet industry values them — and how elusive their attention can be, even for a small app.
Instagram, bought by Facebook in 2012, is less than 12 years old. It has a lot to do with teens, but rivals like TikTok, the Chinese video app, and Snapchat, the ephemeral messaging app, continue to austerity in its wake.