About a decade ago, no one could ever imagine that Instagram would have transformed into a phenomenon that it is today. When people were getting obsessed with Facebook and Twitter to grow their social networks, Instagram was setting up its unique features that seemed like a dream to many. 

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Today, the marketing industry has become so dynamic, calling for specific measures by companies to survive the competition. In response, marketers are increasingly adopting Instagram to promote their items, ranging from home items to apparel brands. However, the demands of customers keep changing. 

Thus, Instagram is striving to present a state of the art features that bring better tastes to the customers. These updates have sustained users in the game where they can find the best algorithms on the Instagram interface. 

Below are examples of Instagram updates that you need to be aware of to give you an edge over your peers in 2020:

Feed Posts Designed as Stories
If you have a brand or you are running a small business, 2020 comes with good tidings. You will be able to use a mechanism of sharing feed posts into stories. Assuming you are an online dealer selling accessories, this feature comes in handy for your business. If a customer purchases some headscarves from you, you definitely compel them to post images on their profiles. 

Through this mechanism, they will also include short descriptions of the product and applaud your brand for offering very high quality items. The customers will tag you in their posts, giving you a chance to share the same in your Instagram stories. Apparently, as an entrepreneur, you will have benefited from organic advertisements. 

Your initial step will be to click on the airplane button which you will see under the post. The next step is for you to select an option that says “Create a story with the post.” The page opens up to a feed post that you can view as a sticker. Normally, the post will have a background theme that resembles that of the original post. 

There is a provision for you to add some text or features to the post so to make it more interactive. Each post that customers share through this Stories medium is linked back to the original post. The poster’s name is also included in the post, giving you a great chance to advertise your business and also flaunt your rich clientele.

Question and Answer (Q&A) Stickers
2020 will also be a great year since Instagram offers you a chance to create highly engaging content with your followers. This update merges Q&A stickers with Instagram live. Initially, it was really confusing to browse through questions that appeared in the comments section. However, this new feature will enable entrepreneurs to engage clients through a live session where they can ask questions and receive answers in real time.

If you are an interested user, you will find a simple question box that requires you to write about your inquiry. This provision gives the respondent the liberty to explain the details of the venture. Most importantly, the clients will get to understand the full details of the products they intend to buy, irrespective of the time that they will be joining the live session. 

The first step is to post a question in your story and launch a live session. Within a short time, you will discover that more clients are posting more questions relating to your business. Next, you need to navigate to the Stories camera and hit the ‘Live’ button. On the left part of the screen, you will see a question mark icon which enables you to see all questions that have been posted to you. 
Tap on any question to launch your question and answer session. Make sure that users post their questions through your Instagram story. If they need to place them during the live session, then it should happen within the comment section.

Removing Followers
Having many followers can be a blessing but a curse in the same measure. Instagram has fake accounts that can sneak into your account and sabotage your list of followers despite investing strategies to create content that is engaging. The owners of these ghost accounts do not comment on your post, hence they drastically lower your rate of engagement.

In this case, you will face serious penalties from Instagram where your profile can be limited since your content is regarded as substandard. 2020 comes with an update that will give you an edge over this challenge. You will be able to manually remove followers hence boosting your engagement rate.

It is a brand new feature that allows you to browse your list of followers and identify ghost accounts. You will then remove them as they appear. You do not have to worry about losing your follower count because this feature enables you to increase your engagement rate. Consequently, your profile will be positively identified for a better rating.

Final Thoughts
Instagram remains an important tool especially in the field of e-commerce. Most entrepreneurs are adopting the use of social media as a marketing tool. Currently, Instagram comes among the best platforms that you can use to offer your products to a large pool of customers. Apart from the entertainment features that it offers, you can prosper your economic lifestyle through this social media platform.

There is a need to keep improving services for users that is why Instagram developers keep updating the system in favor of customers. In 2020, there is a host of improvements that will be implemented to facilitate better experiences for customers. Most importantly, users will have autonomy over their accounts so that they determine the followers that will add value to their profiles.