👉Background: Instagram is REELY struggling to compete with TikTok. Yep, Insta Reels has less than 10% of the daily view time of TikTok. But internally, Meta is actually more concerned about its inability to tap into creators in the same way as The Tok.

👉 What happened: In fact, an internal Meta doc shows that almost a third of the Reels posted so far were re-runs that had been created on other apps… like TikTok. It kinda explains why trends hit Reels about seven weeks after they went viral elsewhere.

👉 What else: Instagram is now internally testing a tipping feature, which would enable fans to send “gifts” to creators... in the form of cash-money. And this would give creators a new way to make money on the social network for original content.

What's the key learning?

💡Creators are the cornerstone of social media apps, so now social media companies are scrambling to help them monetise their talents and keep them on their platform.

💡First, social media platforms announced creator funds - where the platform would pay the creator directly for posting original content. Think creator funds from TikTok, Meta and Youtube Shorts.

💡Then we saw creator marketplaces - where brands would pay the creator for advertising their products. But now, we're seeing more and more social media companies roll out tipping features - where fans pay creators directly.