Instagram users are rushing to connect with brands: COO Levine
Instagram users are reaching out to advertisers, according COO Marne Levine, who said 80% of consumers have voluntarily connected with brands on the platform. Nevertheless, Levine cautioned that the company has a long way to go to make the shopping experience more accessible. Speaking at New York's Advertising Week event, Levine said Instagram was trying to learn and understand "how people shop on the platform", and added that in the past month, the site had seen 180 million interactions between consumers and businesses. "I think there’s so much more that we can do in this area," she said.

Instagram may just be seven years old but the platform is helping to redefine what it means to launch a business and what relationships with consumers look like.

In fact, 80 percent of people on the platform (there are 800 million monthly users) connect to a business voluntarily, according to Instagram’s COO Marne Levine.

“Shrinking the distance between businesses and customers and bringing you closer to the things that matter to you is really something that we’re focused on,” said Levine at Advertising Week in New York on Wednesday.