Instagram Testing New Account Type For High-Profile Users

Instagram is reportedly testing a new type of account that’s specifically designed for celebrities, influencers and other high-profile personalities. This new type of profile is called “Creator Account” and it will provide users with new tools to track their audience and filter their messages.

Instagram is already beta testing Creator Accounts with a small group of users before officially rolling it out to a wider group of people sometime next year, according to The Hollywood Reporter. This new type of account will offer celebrities and other influencers an alternative to using Instagram’s Business Profiles, which was introduced by the company in 2016.

Like Business Profiles, having a Creator Account will offer users an experience that’s tailor-made for them. It will come with a tool that will allow them to keep track of their follows and unfollows through detailed analytics. Previously, Instagram didn’t offer such a thing. The closest feature that’s related to that are notifications for new followers, as pointed out by 9To5Mac.

The new growth insights tool will provide influencers and celebrities weekly and daily data to show them how their follower count has changed. The feature will also show them which of their content was most engaging, which could inform them on why their follower count suddenly spiked or declined. These new set of tools will work across the main Instagram Feed, Stories and the video-centric IGTV.

Another feature that will be exclusive to high-profile users with Creator Accounts are new direct messaging tools. One of the tools will allow influencers to filter notes from their brand partners. There’s also the ability to filter direct messages by read, unread and flagged messages. Celebrities and influencers who have a Creator Account on Instagram will also be able to rank their pending requests by relevance or time.

The last tool that will be available to Creator Accounts are flexible labels for contacts, which allow users to take control on how people are able to contact them on Instagram. For example, a user could simply remove the ability for others to email or call them directly from their profile.

Currently, some high-profile users on Instagram have decided to simply use Business Profiles. The problem with this is some of the tools included in that type of account aren’t really meant for celebrities or influencers. Instagram product manager Ashley Yuki said that the idea behind Creator Accounts was to provide creators a specialized experience that specifically caters to their needs.

Aside from delivering a better experience for creators, Instagram may have decided to develop Creator Accounts to deter its most prominent users from using third-party solutions. There are already a number of services that can provide these types of tools to influencers. Unfortunately, some are fake and hackers are using them to steal accounts, according Mashable.