It's time to celebrate! Bring out the smartphone cameras - it's Instagram's 3rd birthday! And, wow, have they achieved so much in just 3 short years!

In case you're not familiar with how popular Instagram really is, I posted some interesting stats last week about the demographics and environment of Instagram. If you didn't catch that post, you can read it here.

Can you believe that since Instagram launched on October 6, 2010, they have accumulated over 150 million users!? That's a lot of people in a short period of time. Just for comparison, it took Facebook over 4 years to reach 100 million users.

Instagram's third year brought other milestones including the introduction of video. In a broad move, Instagram created a video feature that maintains its inherent personality while challenging the other video applications available today. If you want to read more about the video features, you can read my post here.

And, going into its fourth year, Instagram is poised for more growth and financial gain. Recent reports indicate that ads will be rolling out on the platform within the next couple months. And, if they adhere to what they have stated, the ads should be an opportunity for businesses to reach new audiences while not disturbing the "natural" Instagram world we know and love. A lot of people are complaining about the news of ads and threatening to leave the platform. I, however, think that these can be a great addition to our social media strategies. In fact, I wrote another post about just this topic, which you can read here.

I am super excited to see how Instagram grows over the next year!

And, in honor of Instagram's birthday, I thought we should share our Instagram handles in the comments - let's have our own Instagram fan party, right here! If you want to participate, include the link to your Instagram account in the comments below and subscribe to the comments so that you see the follow-up comments. Please follow any new accounts that you find interesting!