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Instagram gets commercial

Meghan McCarty Carino May 1, 2019
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Carl Court/Getty Images

Instagram gets commercial

Meghan McCarty Carino May 1, 2019
Carl Court/Getty Images
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COPY

Instagram, the photo-sharing platform owned by Facebook, is already full of “influencers” like the Kardashians, or model Gigi Hadid, who have huge followings and post about products they use, or get paid to use. It announced yesterday that it’s making it possible for users to buy those same products from influencers right in the app, without linking out to separate websites. Instagram has been testing a new in-app checkout system for its advertisers for a couple of months. But what makes us Insta-buy? And what could more retail mean for the future of the social network?

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