Will Trial Reels Help You?

Instagram recently announced that they are rolling out "Trial Reels". These are a chance to send out your Reels to NON-FOLLOWERS only as a means to "test" out styles, content, format, etc. without risking your existing followers wondering what you're doing.

Now, for most brands, this probably isn't something you'll use. You rely heavily on your followers (fans, customers, etc.) to interact with your content early and eagerly. Yes, you want non-followers seeing your content, but typically, your existing audience is feeding most of your engagement.

So, if that's you, this may seem weird or irrelevant. And that's ok! You do NOT have to use these.

But for the creatives - the stand up comics, the musicians, the meme-creators, the beauty influencers, the fashionistas, and many more - there are plenty of reasons why you might want to "try" some content on strangers before you show it to your followers.

And if you decide to use these trial Reels, you can do so by toggling on "Trial" from the Reel upload screen (where you put caption, tags, etc.). While it's in trial mode, it also lives in your Reels drafts for you. Anyone who sees the Reel in their feed will think it's a normal Reel - there's no indication that you're trialing it on them.

Of course, engagement won't be as high on a trial Reel because your devoted fans aren't seeing it so you're hitting a cold audience. But you can review the metrics and decide if you want to share it with everyone or remove it. There's also an option at upload that can put the onus on IG to automatically share it to everyone after 72 hours if IG determines it's performing well enough. What that "enough" is though.... I don't know.

So, if this sounds fun or helpful, give them a shot! If it sounds overwhelming or odd for your brand, then skip it. There's no obligation to use these.