Last week, social analytics company, Locowise, released an interesting report on Instagram analytics.

The most interesting piece of data: Post engagement rates had dropped from 12 percent in Dec. 2015 to just 0.95 percent in January 2016.

Wow.

As you know, late last year, Instagram opened up its ad platform to all brands. And many jumped at the chance.

According to this AdWeek article, ad impressions have increased by 13 times over the last five months.

Wow.

Anecdotally, I have noticed a TON of ads in my stream. I even blogged about it a while back. So, the 13 times stat doesn’t surprise me, and may even be low.

And finally, I’m already seeing the power of Instagram advertising with some clients. While I can’t share engagement numbers or rates, let’s just say they’ve “exceeded expectations” (and when I say “exceeded expectations” what I really mean is “crushed all forms of any expectations we may have had.”).

You know where all this is heading, right?

Instagram Zero.

Facebook went through it a couple years ago. As we all know, Facebook is now merely an advertising platform for brands.

Organic reach is nil. But, advertising options are a plenty–and, in many cases, they are very effective.

Instagram is now heading down that very same road–as we suspected all along.

More brands will tinker with Instagram advertising this year.

More brands will see the same success I’m seeing with clients.

And, more brands will continue to see less and less engagement on organic posts–something they were cheering about just a year ago (and quite loudly, I might add).

So, it appears Instagram Zero is now within reach. If I had to look into the future, I’d say with 9-12 months away.

Prepare accordingly now.