World Leaders on Instagram Burson-Marsteller goes #BehindTheScenes

Executive Summary

Instagram may not have the reach of its better-known social media rivals, but it has an ever-increasing

following - something world leaders and their advisors have not been slow to recognize.

The heads of state and government and foreign ministers of 136 countries currently have an official

presence on Instagram, representing 70 percent of all United Nations (UN) member states.

In February 2016, 10 Downing Street became the latest seat of government to set up an official

Instagram account to enhance communications of the @UKPrimeMinister.

Instagram is a platform dedicated to highly visual communication. Users can upload a single picture,

traditionally in a square format, and can apply a range of different filters and add an unlimited amount

of text. The platform is primarily associated with more artistic shots, which allows followers to like and

comment on posts. Unlike other platforms, the image, rather than the text, tells the story. Instagram,

owned by Facebook, claims 400 million monthly active users worldwide and its visual nature makes it a

perfect channel for leaders to address their constituents.

Over the past four years governments and world leaders have flocked to the mobile photo and video

sharing social network to share their official pictures with a worldwide audience. Governmental

Instagram usage is especially high in Europe, Latin America and among Asian countries, mainly among

Gulf Corporation Council (GCC) countries. The 305 accounts analyzed in this study, conducted by global

PR firm Burson-Marsteller, have a combined total of nearly 23 million followers.

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Who is the Most Followed?

Barack Obama’s campaign account (@BarackObama), set up on January 4, 2012 for the election

campaign of the same year, is the most followed Instagram account of any world leader, with more than

6 million followers, far ahead of Russian

Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev with

more than 2 million followers. India’s

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is in

third place, despite having posted only

37 pictures, just ahead of the White

House with 1.7 million followers each.

Queen Rania of Jordan and HH Sheikh

Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum,

the Ruler of Dubai, each have 1.4

million followers. Turkey's President

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Iran's Supreme

Leader Ali Khamenei, Argentinian

President Mauricio Macri and Egyptian

President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi complete

the Top 10 list with more than half a

million followers each.

Barack Obama is also the most effective

leader on Instagram, with more than

56,000 interactions (comments and likes)

for every post on the site. He is closely

followed by the Indian Prime Minister.

Russia’s Dmitry Medvedev; HH Sheikh

Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the

Ruler of Dubai; and Sheikh Abdullah bin

Zayed Al Nahyan, the Foreign Minister of

the United Arab Emirates, all receive

more than 25,000 interactions per post.

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The most liked post of all world leaders is the Thank You picture of Barack Obama after being reelected

on November 7, 2012; Barack Obama also posted the most commented picture, garnering almost

200,000 comments on the image showing the U.S. President getting a

flu shot with the caption: “Tell us how your life is

#BetterWithObamacare”.

Barack Obama was notably the first world leader to set up an Instagram

account, on January 4, 2012, followed by Argentina's President

Mauricio Macri and Danilo Medina, the President of the Dominican

Republic. However, a number of world leaders have given up posting on

the network after the initial enthusiasm wore off: A third of the

accounts surveyed have either been dormant for more than a year or

have never been active.

All world leaders combined have posted a total of 76,387 photos and videos and the vast majority of

posts are pictures of large gatherings such as election rallies, conferences, government meetings and

bilateral meetings with their foreign counterparts.

The Information Department of the government of Brunei is the most active government account, with

more than four posts per day on average. The Foreign Ministry and the Foreign Minister of Kuwait are

also prolific. The presidential administration of Venezuela often packs nine shots into one post, using the

Instagram Layout app. These

governments have discovered

Instagram as a formidable channel

to post pictures of their leaders’

daily activities and their Instagram

accounts have become the central

repository for all official

government pictures. However,

few of the pictures are particularly

riveting and many are posting

staged handshake pictures, which

get few likes and which would

possibly be better used on

Snapchat where they disappear

after 24 hours.

What to Post?

As the saying goes, a picture is

worth a thousand words, but Instagram is not the most obvious social network to make policy

statements or hard-hitting announcements. A few governments have posted screenshots of their most

salient tweets on Instagram in the hope of increasing their impact.

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Others have posted a picture of their leader with an excerpt from

a speech or a screenshot of a presidential decree. The White

House generally posts pictures of presidential letters of pardon

and Buckingham Palace posts selected royal letters, be it to

congratulate the Davis Cup team or the latest British astronaut in

space. A number of politicians have promoted hashtags to

support specific campaigns, such as the campaign to

#BringBackOurGirls, (those who have been abducted by Boko

Haram), or calling on followers that it is #TimeToAct to end

sexual violence against women, initiated by the UK Foreign

Office.

It is particularly difficult to break sad news and express condolences on Instagram, such as after the

Paris attacks in November 2015 which drew international condemnation. Several world leaders such as

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, Secretary of State John Kerry

and many others posted pictures signing the book of condolences in their respective French embassies.

The British Monarchy posted a picture of the Union Jack being

lowered on Buckingham Palace while others posted pictures of

government buildings lit up in the French Tricolor.

After the downing of Air Malaysia flight MH17 over eastern

Ukraine on July 17, 2014, Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak

posted a black and white picture of his press conference and a

black and white picture of the plane with the hashtag

#PrayForMH17.

Many politicians take to Instagram during election campaigns and

use the network generally to show a lighter side of their

personality. Once elected, their accounts become less interesting with less popular engagement. The

Instagram accounts of Chile’s President Michelle Bachelet, Polish President Andrez Duda, Italian Prime

Minister Matteo Renzi, and Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa have all been dormant since their

election and the picture of their election is their last post. The account of the Dutch royal household

(@Koninklijkhuis) went into abeyance shortly after King Willem-Alexander acceded to the throne in April

2013.

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Accounts Worth Following

A handful of accounts stand out for posting unusual, behind-the-

scenes pictures. These accounts are often run by the official

photographer or a dedicated social media team. While some

photographers will slavishly follow their leader, posting every single

picture of their meetings, others have an artistic license to post

unusual pictures, capturing private moments of our leaders.

Probably the best account to follow for personal pictures is that of the

@WhiteHouse, run by Pete Souza, the chief official White House

photographer, who also has a popular private channel on the network.

Souza and his team have captured private moments of President

Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama which are then posted

on different social media channels, including Instagram. In late 2015,

the team even invited a group of 20 Instagrammers to the White House for a #WHInstaMeet letting

them “roam through the White House taking pictures”. The U.S. administration also organized the

#BigBlockOfCheeseDay, inviting Instagram followers to put

questions to senior administration officials after the presidential

State of the Union address.

If you ever wanted to know what it means to take pictures behind

the scenes, have a look at the posts from the State Department

(@StateDept). While Secretary John Kerry never takes his own

pictures, his official photographers capture unusual pictures from

his meetings and trips which the social media team in Washington

edits and posts on the official profile.

The official photographer of German Chancellor Angela Merkel is trying

to emulate the U.S. administration’s approach and has shared

fascinating pictures from unusual angles during her official visits on the

account of the @Bundeskanzlerin. Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian

Kurz has a small team of social media editors identified as #InstaLisa

and #InstaStefan who follow ‘Sebastian’ on his official trips abroad and

post #BehindTheScenes pictures on the @TeamKurz account.

And finally @The_British_Monarchy has been sharing unusual

pictures of the royal household, including the preparations and the

menus of State Banquets, traditionally in French. The account also

makes its followers salivate with some of the 20,000 slices of cake

served at the Queen’s annual garden party. One of the most unusual

shots is of a horse’s hoof being polished in black for the state visit of

the Mexican President. Buckingham Palace also posts pictures of

award recipients, but almost no private shots from the Queen herself.

Occasionally the account will repost photos of Prince George from the

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@KensingtonRoyal Instagram account. The Russian government has set up a dedicated picture feed for

all official Instagram pictures at @Photogovernment.

Do they manage their own account?

Fifteen world leaders manage their Instagram accounts themselves and usually take their own pictures

and selfies, namely Presidents Joko Widodo (@Jokowi), @MauricioMacri, @PenaNieto, Prime Ministers

@damedvedev, @Erna_Solberg, @LeeHsienLoong, @Najib_Razak, @TRoivas, and Foreign Ministers

@DidierReynders, @EdgarsRinkevics, @GebranBassil, @kasnms, @Khalid_bin_Ahmad,

@KristianJensenum and @NasserJudeh.

Probably the most entertaining world leader on Instagram is Singapore’s

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong (@LeeHsienLoong). The 63-year-old

politician has posted more than 40 ‘wefies’ or group selfies. Prime Minister

Lee even posted a selfie from his hospital bed after surgery to remove his

prostate gland. He sometimes captures other world leaders in his selfies and

even started to present his snapshots as official presents to his guests. His

regular “#GuessWhere” photographic riddles are one of the key reasons to

follow his account.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev

(@damedvedev) is an amateur

photographer and occasionally takes pictures out of airplanes or

helicopters on his trips around the country. His picture before landing

on the island of Kunashir in Russia’s Far East provoked the ire of the

Japanese government, which is claiming ownership over the disputed

island. Medvedev also made a strong political statement when posting

a picture of apples on an apple tree, claiming that “Our apples are no

worse than foreign!” in reference to the import restrictions on western

produce in retaliation to the economic sanctions against Russia.

Bahrain’s Foreign Minister, Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, clearly enjoys

life judging from his Instagram posts. Be it playing golf, sampling Cuban

cigars or sharing holiday snapshots from Havana, Portofino, Lake

Como, Montreux or the Bahamas, his Instagram feed

@Khalid_bin_Ahmad is a mix of official pictures, selfies with friends

and colleagues and very personal posts. On his Instagram feed you can

discover pictures of the most exquisite dinners as well as a collection

of close-ups of his prayer beads.

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First, Let’s Take a Selfie

Most world leaders have embraced the selfie culture of their fans, happily agreeing to be featured in

selfies, the digital equivalent of an autograph. A group of admirers will generally cuddle up close to their

favorite leader to take a selfie. Especially during election campaigns,

the Instagram accounts come alive with pictures of politicians

surrounded by a crowd of admirers wanting to capture a selfie. Selfies

seem to become a challenge for the security of some world leaders, as

illustrated by some of the French President’s images now containing

blurred images of his body guards in the background.

Quite a few world leaders have joined the selfie craze and are happy

to capture their audiences at political rallies and meetings. However,

instead of sharing the selfies on their own Instagram feed, the social

media teams will share the picture of the leader taking the selfie to

illustrate his or her popularity. To take a selfie you often need a long

arm. A handful of government leaders have taken selfies to a new

level: the Prime Ministers of Malaysia, Spain and Turkey have all been

pictured using selfie sticks to capture their audience in their group

selfie or “groufies.”

Najib Razak, the Prime Minister of Malaysia, has taken a series of

selfies with his international counterparts from Barack Obama to the

Prime Minister of Singapore. Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg,

who manages her Instagram account herself, often posts group selfies,

including one with other world leaders as does the Foreign Minister of

Kuwait who captured Monaco’s Prince Albert on the sidelines of the

UN General Assembly. Whatever you think about selfies, they are far

more personal and entertaining than traditional, handshake pictures.

Some world leaders have also shared solo selfies. Russian Prime

Minister Dmitry Medvedev regularly gratifies his followers with a

selfie. His mirror-selfie in an elevator to thank his 400,000 followers

has become his most popular post, liked more than 200,000 times.

Bahrain’s Foreign Minister took a selfie on top of the Burj Khalifa, the

highest building in the world, to express his amazement at the

development of Dubai.

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In general, world leaders have little time to take pictures of

themselves or to post them to their Instagram channel. Latvian Foreign

Minister Edgars Rinkēvičs exclusively posts wildlife and landscape

pictures and sometimes pictures from an airplane, as does his

Jordanian counterpart Nasser Judeh. Instagram allows world leaders to

show a very personal side. Estonian Prime Minister Taavi Roivas

happily shares personal family selfies with his wife and daughter

among pictures of his official meetings. Lebanese Foreign Minister

Gebran Bassil also mixes official pictures with his personal holiday

pictures and selfies with his children, but rarely adds descriptions to

his snapshots. That task is often left to their official photographer who will build a visual profile of the

leader. Instagram is the ideal channel to show a leader in a new light – either playing football,

basketball, volleyball or rugby, enjoying skiing in winter or jogging, running a marathon or a triathlon.

Our leaders seem to be very sporty and health conscious judging from their Instagram feeds.

Who is the Most Creative?

After having reviewed tens of thousands of pictures posted on Instagram we would like to highlight

several rather creative ones.

- The Estonian Prime Minister shared a close-up of a bowl of oranges with the caption: “We’ve

arrived in Georgia” in reference to the country’s role as a citrus fruit exporter during Soviet

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times. Taavi Rõivas also shared a snapshot of his leg and that of an unidentified visitor both

wearing colorful socks.

- Argentina’s President Mauricio Macri shared a picture of his

legs under the presidential table as well as a picture of his

closet with “two shirts and a tie (just in case)”.

- The White House shared a similar picture of Barack Obama’s

wardrobe, explaining that “the President's suiting up for the

big speech” ahead of the State of the Union address in 2015.

- Hungary’s Viktor Orban posted a picture of his tie on a chair,

explaining that it was “Saturday 07:45” after all.

- The European Commission’s social media manager shared a

close-up picture of changing shoes at the annual meeting of

the World Economic Forum in Davos.

- Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee used a similar picture of his shoes on the floor mat of Facebook’s

HQ to post a cheeky “#GuessWhere”-post.

- The presidential administration of Ecuador shared a picture of President Rafael Correa making

the sign of the heart to wish a happy holidays.

- Justin Trudeau paid homage to Canadian actor Leonard Nimoy, better known as Spock from Star

Trek, by imitating Spock’s signature salute. The Instagram feed of Canada’s newly elected Prime

Minister is worth following for its candor.

A fifth of all the photos posted by world leaders have been ‘embellished’ with Instagram filters.

Valencia, Amaro, Lo-fi, Rise, X-Pro II, and Ludwig are the most popular filters used by world leaders.

Only four percent of all the Instagram publications by world leaders are videos, however each video

receives on average 4,300 likes, double as many as a simple picture. The number of video posts is bound

to increase as government communications become more professionalized. The most liked post from

the White House is a video of Michelle and Barack Obama’s Halloween greetings. The Elysée Palace in

Paris shares mainly professionally produced 15-second videos of François Hollande’s activities on

Instagram, a shorter version of which often will be posted on the Elysée’s Vine channel. The @EUCouncil

has also increased its video production on Instagram, editing arrivals of European leaders or summing

up foreign visits by European Council President Donald Tusk. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte

(@minpres) publishes regular 15 second Instagram vlogs. The Irish government @MerrionStreet started

its foray into Instagram with a series of video statements from ministers about the 2014 budget. Among

the more entertaining clips is the video of Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev ice fishing.

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Finally, several leaders have shown their creativity and Instagram

mastery by building collages with a series of Instagram posts. Brazilian

President Dilma Rousseff and Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy

both posted a series of pictures to form a collage during their

respective election campaigns. The European Commission posted three

pictures in a row to capture the EU team around a long table at the COP

21 in Paris. The managers of the account also created a collage with the

Berlaymont building, the Commission’s headquarters, as well as a

collage with four pictures of Jyrki Katainen, the EU Commission Vice

President which look great on mobile devices, where most users access

Instagram.

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About This Study

World Leaders on Instagram is Burson-Marsteller's latest research into how world leaders, governments

and international organizations communicate via social media. The research builds on Burson-

Marsteller's highly acclaimed annual Twiplomacy study. Initially focused solely on Twitter, the 2016

study is being expanded to other social media platforms including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube,

Google+ and more niche digital diplomacy platforms such as Snapchat and Vine.

Burson-Marsteller has identified a total of 305 Instagram, 35 of which have been verified by Instagram

and carry a blue verification mark. The 270 remaining pages are not verified, but we believe that they

can be considered as official pages. Interestingly 64 pages are dormant for more than a year and 33 are

inactive and have never posted a single photo. 15 accounts are private and we could not get any data.

We did not include accounts set up by private individuals, such as a fan page for Pope Francis

(@Pontifex_es) which, despite its 100,000 followers, is clearly not official, nor the page of the Russian

President @President_Vladimir_Putin which has more than 25,000 followers but is not his official page.

We have also discarded the @Kremlin_Russian page, which has half a million followers but posts

political cartoons and unflattering pictures of Western leaders which are hopefully not endorsed by the

Kremlin. The page of the King of Morocco (@Roi.du.Maroc.Mohammed.6) is not official, either, despite

sharing amazingly candid personal pictures of King Mohamed VI. Lastly, we have not included inactive

pages without a profile picture as it was virtually impossible to determine their authenticity.

Data was collected on February 2, 2016, using Burson-Marsteller’s proprietary Burson Tools to analyze

the 305 world leaders’ Instagram accounts. More than 30 variables were considered, including:

followers, following, post count, post likes and post comments, et al.

The full data set can be downloaded here.

Thank you to Matthias Lüfkens for his ongoing strategic guidance on Twiplomacy and the World Leaders

on Social Media series.

February 2016