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Instagram announced last Wednesday that they’re adding in a “Black-owned” label for U.S. based shops. Business accounts are now able to display the “Black-owned Business” label on their bio and may be included on the shops page to help bring in more customers. In recent memory, users have been asking whether certain businesses are Black-owned or not and the addition of the labels will help users trust brands when it comes to their products.
While Instagram currently does not have concrete numbers in terms of businesses, there are a lot of expectations to come from this feature. More than 1.3 million Instagram posts included the words “Black-owned” or “Black led” during summer and fall of 2020 at the height of the Black Lives Matter movement. The number of U.S. based businesses who listed the labels above in their profiles or posts increased by 50% during this time as well.
With the label being put in place, it will not contribute to information that the algorithm will take into the account. They will, however, contribute to subsequent engagement with related accounts to the label. That means that accounts who keep tabs on Black-owned businesses are more likely to see them on their feed as opposed to those that don’t. This then helps those businesses gain more exposure on the app and potentially increase their revenue from the year before.
What do you think of Instagram adding in the label for Black-owned businesses? Let us know in the comments below.
This article originally posted on GREY Journal.
