Facebook’s Instagram will show ads in IGTV soon, launches ‘Badges for Live’ to help creators earn

Instagram has finally decided to show ads in IGTV videos. The Facebook-owned social media firm said in a blog post that this will begin from next week and the advertisement revenue will be shared with the creators as well. However these will be tested with a small group of advertisers and creators in the US and will expand slowly to other regions.

Instagram says that these  ads will appear when people click to watch IGTV videos from previews in their feed. Also mentioned was that the video ads are built for mobile and for videos that are 15 seconds long at least.

Although the inclusion of ads might not be taken well by millions of users, it sure brings IGTV on the same level as YouTube that has been using this model since years. This may not just help creators earn more but also answer the question of why IGTV, being a similar video platform as YouTube, did not provide any such benefits.

But that said, Instagram has said that it will be constantly working on how to handle advertisements on its platform and might as well bring the ‘skip ads’ option in future “to make sure the final result works well for people, creators and advertisers.”

In addition to this, Instagram also announced the ‘Badges in Live’ feature. These are badges that viewers can purchase during a live video. “With badges, creators can generate income from the content they’re already creating,” says the firm. These are supposed to appear next to the person’s name throughout the live video.

What does these new badges bring?

As Instagram says, fans who have purchased badges in Live will ‘stand out’ in the comments and unlock additional features while watching the video. It also includes placement on a creator's list of badge holders and access to a special heart sign in comments.