Instagram Business: Tips and best practices#
Collecting follower count metrics#
To include follower counts in your Instagram Business report, use the following metrics:
lifetime_follower_count#
This metric returns the current follower count for the profile at the time of the fetch. Historical data is not available for this metric.
follower_count#
This metric returns the follower count by audience for the selected time period.
Due to the following API limitations, the sum of the audience metric values may be less than the total follower count for the profile:
Audience metrics only return the top 45 results. For example, for audience_city, only the 45 cities with the highest number of followers will be returned
Only users who have provided demographic data are included in demographic metric calculations
Understanding follower data variations#
The Instagram API considers “lifetime” as the last 2 years and only counts follows, not unfollows. A variance in the total followers from the UI is expected.
follower_count by audience will not sum to total followers as not all followers have demographics available.
Understanding follower granularity options#
Follower gain can be fetched for periods: day, week, 28 days
Total lifetime followers will fetch the current total followers (based on 2 years of follows but not unfollows), historical dates not available
Lifetime refers to the last 2 years
Optimizing Stories data collection#
Stories are only available for 24 hours, and a fetch captures a snapshot of results at the time of the fetch. You need to fetch as close to the final minute as possible (usually every 15 minutes) then bundle the results by the posted date and use a transformation to keep only the most recent fetch for each story.
Recommended scheduling for Stories#
To report stories effectively, fetch every 15 minutes then bundle to keep only the most recent fetch.
Schedule every 15 minutes with lifetime granularity, then:
Bundle once a day and apply transformation to retain the stories most recent fetch time
Schedule fetch as yesterday offset by a day to ensure you have a full day of stories fetched up until the last 15 minutes they were available
Keep only the most recently fetched row per story
Calculating story completion rate#
Story completion rate is not available via the API however you may calculate this yourself.
Consideration: First and last Stories are not identifiable, therefore the workaround is to calculate completion rate based on the MIN and MAX number of impressions for stories within a day.
Understanding data attribution#
Activity is attributed to posts by created date therefore you cannot see activity overtime for historical posts.
Recommended datastream configurations#
Instagram | Insights Media Report | Posts#
Date is used in fetch date range, it refers to the date the post was created.
instagram_media_url can be used to click out to preview.
Instagram | Insights User Report | Followers | Current total#
Lifetime followers will fetch the current followers. Historical total followers are not available.
lifetime_follower_count is based on the last 2 years therefore may have slight variance to the UI.
follower_count by audience will not sum to total followers as not all followers have demographics available.
Instagram | Insights Stories Report | Stories#
Data available over 24 hours. To fetch the final metrics you must fetch in the last minutes a story is live.
Therefore best practice is to:
Schedule every 15 minutes, lifetime
Bundle | Stories#
Bundle once a day and apply transformation to retain the stories most recent fetch time.
Schedule fetch as yesterday offset by a day to ensure you have a full day of stories fetched up until the last 15 minutes they were available
Keep only the most recently fetched row per story
Levels of granularity#
Account
Post (instagram_media_id or instagram_story_id)
Data collection limitations#
Not available on IG Users with fewer than 100 followers
Stories data available for 24 hours
Demographic metrics only return the top 45 performers
Follower gain can be fetched for periods: day, week, 28 days
Total lifetime followers will fetch the current total followers (based on 2 years of follows but not unfollows), historical dates not available
Lifetime refers to the last 2 years
Activity is attributed to posts by created date therefore you cannot see activity overtime for historical posts
Previewing an image#
To be able to preview an image, you need to collect instagram_media_url dimension.