What was once a bastion for teens and the tech-savvy to share photos of their feet at the beach, food porn and tall buildings shot from interesting angles, Instagram has now attracted a new set of users – politicians.
According to The Hill’s Twitter Room, Congressmen and women are now jumping on the Instagram bandwagon.
Instagram account for Rep. Steny Hoyer, Maryland
Since being acquired by Facebook in April, the popular photo-sharing site has grown in leaps and bounds.
According to a September comScore report, Instagram now has more active daily visitors on mobile than Twitter!
Many nonprofit organizations that have a visual element (i.e., all of them) still have not heard of Instagram, which is a shame.
The site remains popular due to the absence of ads (but no lack of spam unfortunately) and the pure quality of the site.
Members of Congress use Instagram to:
- Connect directly with their constituents
- Show their personality
- Photographing interesting meetings – for example, House Speaker John Boehner showing Myanmar’s opposition leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi the view from his balcony
- Post photos of Washington DC and Capital Hill
- Showcase photos and events from the Congress person’s home district
Couldn’t your nonprofit use Instagram to do many of these things?
Worth thinking about!
Does your nonprofit use Instagram? If not, why not? If so, post your link in the Comments or on my Facebook Page and we’ll check you out. Thanks for reading!
Comments 3
Wow, nice find. I didn’t know congress was Instagramming! I know of a few nonprofits that are doing a great job on Instagram, for example Charity:water, Heal The Bay, Whole Foods have their Whole Planet organization there, Oceana, even Movember!
I think you are right, Claire, to say that Nonprofits can benefit from Instagram, particularly since it’s so inexpensive. Do you manage a nonprofit or an organization on Instagram?
I work with the company building Nitrogram: a platform to professionally manage Instagram streams. find it at http://nitrogr.am , it gives insights, helps creating galleries that can be moderated easily and posted on websites or via a Facebook tab, and lets you interact with Instagram users directly from your web browser by allowing you to comment and like photos without opening the app.
You can also find our own instagram stream @trynitrogram were we post photos of our office and our team, sometimes having fun with a bit of squashpong! (ping pong + squash, it’s fun) Cheers 🙂
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Thanks for sharing! I work with nonprofits and small businesses that use social media and I use Instagram also for myself. It’s fun!
Appreciate you sharing, great blog.Really looking forward to read more. Awesome. Thank You !!!