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3 Reels Creators Share the Essentials of Short-Form Video

Today’s creators aren’t just making engaging content—they’re influencing culture and purchase decisions, while building community. On Facebook and Instagram, they’re doing it with video-creation tools like Reels, which allows anyone to get creative through short videos that are discoverable to wide audiences.

The expertise and authenticity of creators help make them trusted partners for advertisers who want to reach new audiences and drive business results through branded content. That’s why Meta is making it easier for advertisers to connect with creators and unlock the creativity and business opportunities they bring.

Reels helps drive engagement and growth by showcasing creativity

Meta recently spoke to three top creators at VidCon U.S. about why they use Reels as a form of personal expression and a way to highlight brands to their community.

According to Markian Benhamou, who creates positive videos celebrating culture and diversity, “Video is the new generation of storytelling. It’s a way to spread a message. It’s the way to build a community. I think it’s more powerful than writing an article.”

With Reels on Facebook and Instagram, you can record and edit short videos and add effects and voice overs. Creators are increasingly taking advantage of this feature as an additional way to reach their fans.

This past quarter, Meta saw a more than 30% increase in the time people spent engaging with Reels across both Facebook and Instagram. Whether partnering with creators on Reels or creating them on your own, you can use Reels to help drive engagement and growth by storytelling in a new way. 

Lifestyle creator Luann Diez told us that compiling snippets of her day on Reels “makes it feel more raw, more live, more authentic to the audience, which helps us connect a little bit more.” 

Similarly, Daphnique Springs, a standup comedian and actress who creates relatable comedy content, uses Reels to give her fans a “bite-size snack” of her comedy, and they’ve told her that it helps get them through their day. She noted that video content is “truly visually captivating.” 

As Markian noted, “Reels has been an amazing opportunity to build an audience. It’s all about short-form content that can funnel in a new audience to your long-form content, which is where you can build more of that connection with your followers.” 

Creators are trusted collaborators for branded content

Creators are uniquely positioned to promote brands and products to their followers through video and other content. Partnering with creators on branded content ads (BCAs) has proven to be a successful business strategy for many advertisers. In analyzing a series of results across 15 advertiser tests recently run at Meta, we saw the following results: 

  • On average, adding branded content ads to BAU (business as usual) regular ads reduced CPAs (costs per action) by 19% across all the tests. 
  • On average, across these 15 tests, BAU + BCA strategies had a 53% higher clickthrough rate than BAU only strategies. 

Not only are creators trusted by their fans, but through experimentation and experience, they’re highly skilled in creating content that they know will be well received by their audience. 

As Luann told Meta at VidCon, “Creators have a really genuine, authentic relationship and connection with their audience.” She explained how her Mexican-American immigrant background is something that can help brands connect, because so many people can relate to it. “They have lived this story and they can relate to me, which creates kind of like a bond. And I think it can be very beneficial to brands to use my story.”

Daphnique noted the importance of the analytics tools on Facebook and Instagram, especially when it comes to working with brand partners. “Meta is amazing at giving you precise analytics so that brands can know if you have the audience that they want to attract and work with,” she said. 

This means advertisers know the audience they’re reaching, and creators know how to reach them.

Now it’s easier for advertisers to work with creators

The opportunity for creators to innovate and grow is only expanding, and with that comes new opportunities for advertisers. 

Meta is dedicated to the continued growth and success of creators and businesses on our platform. We’re building new tools to help creators and advertisers succeed.

For example, Instagram’s new creator marketplace, which we’re currently testing in the U.S., allows brands to more easily discover, connect and collaborate with creators directly within the app. Brands can select the creators they’re interested in partnering with based on related interests and send project details, simplifying the process for advertisers. 

As creators continue to grow on Meta’s platform, it’s a great time to explore branded content partnership opportunities and tap into the meaningful connections, experimental creativity and entrepreneurial growth that they bring to Facebook and Instagram every day through Reels and other content.

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Learn more about creator marketing partnerships on our Creators for Business page.