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Connector Improvement: Instagram Total Followers Gained (Followers Gained - Followers Lost)

Natti Kongphichphan User

As of now Instagram Businesses connector is not accurate, as it only counts followers gained but not followers lost. 

When summing up the total, this is still not correct as well. An overall improvement to this connector is needed.

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2 comments

Date Votes
  • Stuart User

    Yes please @...

  • Mucker Martin User

    Hi Team, 

    I currently have a ticket in with Instagram support to understand logic they might provide behind this calculation. Below is a description of how the logic is used to determine the Followers Lost and a lineage for Followers Gained and Total Followers.

    Note: We connect to the Instagram API to capture the metric FOLLOWERS_COUNT. 

    I obtain the FOLLOWERS_COUNT value from the IG API.  This metric shows the total followers the page has when the API call is made and is stored as PAGE_DAILY_TOTAL_FOLLOWERS in Snowflake.  This value is obtained daily and the API call is run at approximately 1:15AM CST.

    I obtain the FOLLOWER_COUNT value from the IG API.  This metric shows the total NEW followers added to the site and is stored as PAGE_DAILY_FOLLOWERS_GAINED in Snowflake.  This value is obtained daily and the API call is run at approximately 1:15AM CST.

    For the Followers lost, I do a calculation that uses the previous day’s total followers, the new followers gained in the current day, and the total followers for the current day.  The logic is as follows:

    1. If the previous day value for total followers is missing, the calculation is not performed and the value is set to Null. 
    2. If the previous day value for total followers is available, the Prior Day’s total followers value is added to the new followers in the current day.  This total then subtracts the current day’s total followers and the net amount represents the followers lost.

     

    For example, if the page had 1200 followers yesterday and the next day, the page had 100 followers gained and had a total followers count of 1250, the followers lost would be 50. ((1200+100)-1250) = 50

    NOTE: There are some challenges here; in some cases, the value can become negative.  This occurs when the most recent day’s total followers become greater than the previous day’s total followers plus the new followers added.  I suspect that is may be from to people who previously followed, then unfollowed the page, following it again.  I believe the logic for new followers added only produces the brand new followers.  In any case, that is what is causing the negative value. Again, I have reached out to IG Support to get guidance. 

    Thought this might add value to the business case to also add Followers Lost to the metric list. 

    Marty