SPIEGEL: Mr. Kawohl, who wants to advertise, should count on celebrities who have as many followers and post several times a day on Facebook. Right?
Kawohl: No, this procedure is not media-appropriate. We evaluated over 2300 posts from 37 digital superstars and came up with completely different results. Facebook, for example, is overrated. Those who are strategically smart are more likely to rely on Instagram today.
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SPIEGEL: But with almost twice as many users as Instagram, Facebook is still the largest social network.
Kawohl: Maybe, but the growth rates of the influencers we investigate are more than ten times higher on Instagram than on Facebook. Most importantly, 3.7 percent of Instagram engagement rates are nearly 20 times higher than on Facebook. Twenty times! The Instagram engagement rates of 3.7 percent mean: Of the 100 followers I have, an average of three of them respond to each of my posts by sharing, commenting or just liking it. On Facebook, on the other hand, I would have to post ten times as much to get even half as many responses.
SPIEGEL: Is the high interaction rate perhaps simply because Instagram is easier to use? Most users just distribute little hearts, while Facebook and especially Twitter are discussed much more intensively.
Kawohl: Maybe, but if you do not feel like having a discussion, you could just click on "Like" on Facebook without writing a comment. But even this simple click is too much for many users, as we have found on Facebook a great lethargy. The music is now more on Instagram.
SPIEGEL: But it still applies: Much helps a lot. So, who has many followers gets more attention?
Kawohl: Not even that's right, we noticed. From a certain number of followers, the interaction rate goes down. Global stars like Ronaldo have well over 20 million followers, but not very high interaction rates. Perhaps such super-promis will simply attract too many half-hearted followers. For example, look at the profile of American singer Selena Gomez, who in 2018 had the most reachable personal Instagram profile in the world with 145 million followers. Their interaction rates of around 2.75 percent are relatively low. We've found that the optimal number of followers is about 12 million. More is no longer possible.
SPIEGEL: Compared to Gomez, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates scores comparatively poorly with "only" 2.8 million Instagram fans.
Kawohl: Again, the sheer number of followers is misleading. Bill Gates may not have the most followers, but he has one of the highest interaction rates, at 12.86 percent. Gates beats Gomez by more than a factor of four as far as the enthusiasm of his fans is concerned.
SPIEGEL: Galt Gates used to be more of a hatred figure and a quasi monopolist?
Kawohl: Maybe, but in the mainstream he is still perceived as the epitome of success. Gates is considered by many to be the richest man in the world, even though he has long since been deposed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. He just comes across sympathetically, according to the motto: the billionaire, who could be my neighbor.
SPIEGEL: That's surprising, because Gates does not post very much. Compared to the widespread "overseating" he seems to be almost reserved.
Kawohl: Exactly. And this restraint is obviously a success factor. Who would have thought that? We wondered about it, because this insight is at odds with public perception of how social media work. Many influencers act according to the principle: The more I post, the more attention I get. But they are wrong. In truth, it is the other way around. After all, the followers feel that as spam, they do not respond anymore. Bill Gates achieves his gigantic interaction rates, unlike Gomez, perhaps by his almost old-fashioned restraint. He posts on average less frequently than once a day. This puts it close to the optimum, which we also measured empirically: five to six posts per week are ideal if you post more than once a day, annoying.