What is Instagram Clone? A complete Guide!

Introduction

You might have been living under a rock if you said that you have not heard about the popular photo-sharing app, Instagram. It is no longer a mere photo-sharing app; it has now become an eCommerce portal and app for influencers and businesses. You will be amazed that it had 1 million users within the first two months of its launch. Fast forward to the present, the app recorded 1.2 billion users and 127 million businesses. In 2021, its revenue was 47.6 billion dollars. Suppose you are impressed with Instagram's popularity and achievements and want to launch a similar app. In that case, you can go ahead by making use of an Instagram clone. An Instagram clone is a white-label solution that entrepreneurs and business owners can purchase and use. Moreover, with more effort, you can even dethrone the original app with the help of an Instagram clone. Therefore, read this Instagram clone Development Guide to make your revenue directly proportional to the number of your app users.

Instagram Clone: What is an Instagram Clone?

To explain an Instagram Clone to a layman, we can say that it is a replica of Instagram or a duplicate version. Technically speaking, an Instagram clone is a white-label solution that is available in the market for entrepreneurs and business owners to purchase. The reasons for the existence of an Instagram clone are the massive demand for it by people who love popularity and making money. Another reason is that many people use such apps to stay entertained.

Why do we need an Instagram Clone despite the Instagram app?

Since it is an Instagram clone/ replica, one can expect people to share their videos, photos, or other content, which will be visible globally. Numerous entrepreneurs and business owners develop an Instagram account as it is a business guaranteed to return high profits when invested. Therefore, business owners and entrepreneurs use an Instagram clone for business revenues.

Instagram Clone: What are the benefits of using an Instagram clone?

There are four significant advantages of using an Instagram clone for business owners and entrepreneurs. These perks are as follows:

Instagram Clone #1: Powerful engagement

Businesses need a robust engagement to flourish, and they can get it by using a medium with high reach. An Instagram clone helps companies have an account on a social networking site with which they can attract audiences by exhibiting good and quality content to the masses. When people get attracted to your business, they become an advertisement of our brand to their known and loved ones.

Instagram Clone #2: Free Marketing

Another thing that business owners and entrepreneurs fixate on is marketing, as it is helpful for a business. However, it can be expensive simultaneously.
Therefore, those who want to acquire a plethora of audiences without spending money can use an Instagram clone as it offers free marketing advertising.

Instagram Clone #3: Increases traffic

After engagement and marketing, traffic also plays a pivotal role in sustaining your business. To grow your business, you need to get more traffic, and an Instagram clone is the best source from where you can get more web traffic. Increased traffic ultimately leads to your business getting prosperous and numerous other perks.

Instagram Clone #4: Trust building

An Instagram clone lets you provide your users with different news and different posts regarding your business. It, in turn, increases the trust of your audience that they have in you.

Instagram clone guide: How does Instagram make money? (What is Instagram's revenue model?)

Instagram's revenue is directly proportional to the number of users it has. Thus, the more the user base, the more Instagram earns. The yearly income of Instagram was around 6.48 billion in 2018. If you are getting curious about Instagram's revenue, have a look at the two revenue models of Instagram we list below:

Instagram clone guide #1: Commission

Instagram's revenue through commission is a relatively new strategy and came into play after the success of mini e-commerce sections. It means a person can use the Instagram app as an e-commerce store. In return, Instagram asks for a small share of commission on every successful purchase made through the app. Thus, owners of an Instagram clone can also do the same, that is, integrate eCommerce sections into the Instagram clone and demand a small percentage of commission for every successful purchase made on the app.

Instagram clone guide #2: Advertising

Currently, every social media platform makes money with the help of targeted ads. These social media platforms display ads to users based on their activities and search history. Besides this, Instagram (and eventually an Instagram clone) lets business owners and entrepreneurs advertise via its different features such as IGTV, reels, and stories.

ECommerce stores and brands advertise their products and items on social media platforms to engage users and generate brand awareness amongst the masses. You will be surprised to know that a few brands have even paid Instagram $5 for every CPM.

Instagram clone Development Guide: How to Develop an Instagram Clone?

Instagram has become popular because it was original, and all of its features contribute equally to its rise to success. These features have managed to attract many users with their impact. Thus, it signifies how vital an app's features are to make or break it. Therefore, if you are interested in rolling out an Instagram clone, you will need to examine and scrutinize everything that can make it better than Instagram. The sole reason businesses profit from an Instagram Clone is people's craze for video-first content and video ads. This way of advertising is a significant source of revenue generation for such apps and their owners.

Let us now read what you should do to develop an Instagram clone.

Instagram clone guide #1: Market Research

Your app should be unique to stand a chance to beat its competitors and fare well. For this, you must ensure your app is not just a replica or a rip-off of your rivals. However, while ensuring it is different from others, you must not compromise your user needs.

It calls for market research, and you need to examine your competitors' features and functionalities. Based on these things, you will need to decide on the operating system best suited to your app and can fulfill your target audience's needs.

Therefore, we advise you to find out the geographical location of your target audience, their needs, and specific age group before you make another move. So, it is crucial to dive deep into the market to unravel what works and fails miserably.

Instagram clone guide #2: Define Objective

Instagram creators launched Instagram in 2010 with a definitive objective: a photo-sharing app. Since its inception, it has given its competitors tough competition and has now become an eCommerce portal. Besides being a photo-sharing and an eCommerce portal app, it is also an app for influencers and brands to earn a living. Likewise, you need to decide on the objective for your Instagram clone. You must bear in mind the needs of your target audience to ensure your app becomes popular and a requirement of people. Thus, our piece of advice is to enter the market with a crystal clear aim rather than a plethora of various objectives.

Instagram clone guide #3: Features of your Instagram Clone

One can easily recognize a helpful app from a crappy one by looking at the features the two of them offer. Thus, your app's features make or break your app's future. Since we know that features are more important than we thought, it will be better to incorporate interactive and easy-to-use features to keep customers engaged. Also, your Instagram clone should be a secure environment where they can operate.

Instagram clone Development Guide: What are the essential features to include in your Instagram Clone?

Here we list a few features your Instagram clone needs to have to sustain the competition. These are just the primary features that one expects from an Instagram clone. You can also add more features and unique ones to differentiate your Instagram clone from its contemporaries and the inspiration.

1. Sign up and login
2. Push notifications
3. Instagram Stories
4. Search Option
5. Likes and comments
6. Geolocation integration
7. Profile editing
8. Endless scrolling feed
9. Basic photo editing features
10. Social platform integration
11. Instagram messenger
12. Posting pictures and videos

Let us now read about the features of an Instagram clone required for rolling out a Minimal Viable Product below:

Instagram clone guide #1: Hassle-free registration process

Users see this first screen when they interact with your Instagram clone. At this stage, your user needs to sign up or create their account by giving their information. Therefore, we advise you to add various registration methods such as e-mail, mobile number, or username and keep the UX simple and easy. However, be wary not to ask for all the details in one go; input basic information and acquire the remaining later.

Instagram clone guide #2: Push notifications

An Instagram clone falls into the category of entertainment apps. Thus you need to keep your users entertained to retain them. Push notifications are a great way to keep them glued to your app. In the case of an Instagram clone, push notifications regarding the user's friends' posts and stories and other updates can help you keep them using the app.

Instagram clone guide #3: Stories

Around 500 million users use Instagram stories daily, and it is thus considered one of the best features of Instagram. This feature lures both a regular users and a business owner user of Instagram. Today, business owners can use Instagram stories as an invite-to-engage feature. One can swipe up on a business owner's story to purchase items from them, land up on their store page, etc.

Instagram clone guide #4: Search option

Your Instagram clone must have a search option to let them search for their friends, stores, products, celebrities, meme pages, etc. Besides providing them with a means to search for people, it will be better to give them suggestions in the search bar to attract further attention. Thus, your Instagram clone should have a search option.

Instagram clone guide #5: Direct messages

Today, people use social networking sites to stay in touch with their friends and loved ones. Thus, this need calls for a messaging feature to be present in your Instagram clone. It will be better to include this feature while considering the latest technology. It means that your users should be able to send audio, video, plain text, emojis, stickers, gifs, etc., to one another.

Instagram clone guide #6: Photo editing

The primary aim of any Instagram clone is to share photos. Since they all are photo-sharing apps, you must incorporate the best photo editing features to tempt users to use your app once and retain them for good. We list the essential features that your Instagram clone should offer to users below:

1. image resizing
2. brightness
3. masks
4. adding text
5. settings of contrast
6. geotags
7. AI filters such as guessing the age or analyzing what food or animal the user looks like

Instagram clone guide #7: Global Positioning System (GPS) Integration

This feature is also essential to any Instagram Clone. Since people love to share their photos with their followers, they are very likely to share pictures of their holidays and vacations. Apart from sharing their photos, they like to append the exact location of their place to these photos. Therefore, it will be good if you try to include a GPS integration in your Instagram clone.

Conclusion

Launching an Instagram clone is okay and beneficial. However, launching an original app is better than this. For launching an original app, you should study your rivals' apps and devise a plan to develop your app in the same genre. It will be beneficial to know at this point that launching and developing an original app is a mammoth task, and you should execute it diligently. Do not fret; come to us with your innovative and novel idea. We will help you materialize the idea by making an app that will be the next best thing and might even dethrone the original. If you want to make an Instagram clone, contact us today, and we will start working on it immediately.