Imagine the World Without Instagram.

Written by Marco Brzozowski
Instagram: @marcobrz14

Social media is unpredictable, but it gives entrepreneurs immense potential to start businesses with a small amount of exposure to later proliferate into a successful company. With over a billion users and millions using the platform daily, Instagram is extremely influential and distinguished to let art, moments and innovative ideas flourish; many have created empires just from blogging. Countless influencers are making money by posting and promoting other brands, and one could undoubtedly classify these individuals as entrepreneurs, considering their outgoing personalities and abilities to help build successful, appealing brands and products just from their social media activity. Some of them even depend on what they accumulate from Instagram to make a living. However, what happens to these entrepreneurs, and potential future ones, if Instagram eventually loses its momentum in the industry?

Despite its popularity in the United States, Snapchat has struggled in Europe and other parts of the world and has perfectly demonstrated how quickly a platform can lose its momentum. In the U.S., if someone asks another for his or her Snapchat, chances are the response will be a username. Contrarily, in Europe, if one asks another for his or her Snapchat, chances are there will not be a response at all, but perhaps a confused look instead. Barely anyone in Europe uses it, and, specific reasons aside, whether it be a byproduct of unfavorable opinions on updates or simply cultural elements incompatible with the business model, Snapchat is no longer a “thing” in Europe.

Considering this harsh reality of a quick decline in users, although Instagram is a strong brand and consistent with the product it offers, there is absolutely no predicting what could go wrong in the future. New platforms may arise, ousting Instagram from its leading spot in the industry. Bad decisions could be made on Instagram’s end, yielding updates with angry users demanding for the original features. Perhaps the most dangerous situation could arise, where users simply lose interest. But it leaves an important question: how will entrepreneurs adapt to a modern world without Instagram if it ever disappears?

While predicting the reason for such a demise is impossible, there are a few plausible outcomes, and not all of them are bleak:

1. All entrepreneurs will experience a major setback. There will be a period of decreased entrepreneurial opportunities until another platform reaches Instagram’s size and influence. This may seem a bit excessive, but what other platforms currently have a reputation like Instagram’s? As mentioned before, Snapchat is not doing well. Nevertheless, it still would never be able to help launch a startup considering the brevity of snaps and the content found on the platform. With Snapchat, it is impossible to look at content from days ago, let alone months or years back, to get an idea about a brand or understand an entrepreneur’s story. Unlike Instagram, there is nothing to build with Snapchat because everything disappears. Twitter is not much better. Even with a solid user base, the content available on Twitter does not allow for the exposure Instagram does. Yes, you can tweet pictures, and those pictures remain on your profile forever, but Instagram’s display of such content is the reason entrepreneurs can be so successful. Instagram provides for the immediate, obvious introduction of an idea. Like Snapchat, Twitter will likely remain unable to compete with Instagram’s potential in promotion, which, considering the lack of other major platforms with this ability, leaves the entrepreneurs dependent on social media stranded.
2. Current individuals dependent on Instagram are exposed to losing their livelihoods entirely. As previously stated, Instagram has a natural ability with promotion and exposure, so the individuals who depend on it could lose everything. It is extremely common to see bloggers completely dedicate their lives to being influencers, which is both remarkable and dangerous. Such a career is certainly remarkable because of the immense amount of effort needed to maintain an online presence of glamour and perfection, on top of the confidence and bravery to make a livelihood off of it, and nonetheless because of their talent to create aesthetics that appeal to the potential millions of followers. Yet, it is also a dangerous career, due to social media’s inherent characteristic of trends. It is widely forgotten that platforms reporting and starting trends are trends themselves — products of human interest, preference and idealism. Trends die, and platforms are not excluded from this ugly truth. One might be curious to hear the plan B’s of the countless influencers who quit their jobs and/or schools and whether they are financially ready for the Instagram trend to die. It sounds pessimistic, but, as entrepreneurs, these influencers still have brands to maintain. From a user point of view, it is reasonable to believe these individuals are not ready for such large obstacles. They might be too consumed by living in the now and focusing on posts today instead of focusing on whether posts tomorrow or next year will even exist. Unless you have millions of followers, with a successful startup, the job is demanding. It is natural to neglect such precautions.
3. Culture will instigate the social gravitation towards another platform in a small amount of time, inciting a new social media leader, and by entrepreneurs will relearn how to maximize their content’s effectiveness. Eventually, new incumbents will enter the social media industry. Even if the probability is extremely low, their success can still be explosive. In such a case, where the users of Instagram naturally migrate to a “chosen one” of the social media frenzy, a general mix up of influencers will occur. Previously successful influencers, or entrepreneurs, in this case, will cease to exist in their former capacities, with new influencers being introduced and some retaining their fame and follower bases. However, it must be noted that such a migration would take months, if not years. To create a platform with the publicity potential of Instagram from scratch takes a lot of time, and for users, influencers specifically, to take their entire lives onto a different platform calls for starting at square one all over again. Square one means understanding new ways to post content, the means of communication with followers, and possible limitations like word counts, photo quotas, and troublesome new algorithms. Regardless, such a change obviously calls for a period of disorder and uncertainty, but one could easily conclude that individuals who have already created their empires on Instagram can easily adapt and continue on a new platform. After all, as entrepreneurs promoting brands, perhaps even their own businesses, adapting is the only possible solution to make ends meet.

Although Instagram is currently running extremely well — existing as a strong cultural component to many developed nations — all has been going well for quite a long time. Thankfully, Instagram has not had significant public relation issues, nor has it made bad decisions with updates. The ways to share content, engage with users and explore the world’s countless voices and perspectives are simple, concise and effective. However, all it takes is one bad decision to derail such success (of course, no one is hoping for the demise of Instagram), and such decisions occur — it is only human. Given the clear vulnerability of entrepreneurs on Instagram, if said decisions dismantle the supremacy of Instagram in the realm of social media, the important question stands nevertheless: as we modernize our ways of starting businesses, are we prepared to withstand the repercussions of a social media giant’s collapse?