The scroll effect: How Instagram marketing is shaping new-age consumer behaviour in India

Not too long ago, marketing followed a fairly linear arc. You identified a need, crafted a message around it, and then placed it where your consumer was most likely to encounter it—on television, at retail, in print. The consumer journey was logical, paced, and largely intention-led.

But somewhere along the way, as India’s middle class began living more of its life online, particularly on Instagram, the arc gave way to a loop. The consumer no longer moves through a funnel. She moves through a feed. She doesn’t always know what she wants until the algorithm knows it for her. She doesn’t begin with a need—she begins with a mood.

Instagram has fundamentally reframed how products enter the consumer’s consciousness. Earlier, the discovery was driven by intent. You searched for a moisturiser because your skin felt dry. Today, discovery is often driven by emotion—you scroll past a reel that promises ‘glowing, dewy skin in five seconds’, and suddenly, there is a product in your cart you didn’t know you needed.

This is the power of the platform. It doesn’t wait for demand to arise; it creates it. Through repetition, aesthetic immersion, and the soft persuasion of people you have chosen to follow, Instagram gently nudges products into desirability. And that, in turn, leads to faster and often more impulsive product acceptance. The product hasn’t changed. But the way we arrive at wanting it has.

Influencer as a behavioural catalyst

What has also changed is the nature of influence. Traditional brand marketing relied heavily on authority figures—celebrities, doctors, experts—people who endorsed products from a position of credibility or aspiration.

Instagram flipped the model. Today’s influencer is not above the consumer. They are next to her. They are relatable, familiar, and sometimes even messy. They don’t sell a product so much as show you how it fits into a life that looks like yours or the one you wish you had.

This proximity creates a unique kind of intimacy. When an influencer casually uses a particular sunscreen in a ‘Get Ready With Me’ reel, it doesn’t feel like a pitch. It feels like a suggestion from a friend. And because of this, the barrier to trial drops dramatically.

But even more crucially, influencers don’t just drive trial. They create rituals. They show us how to use the product, when, and with what else. The product is no longer standalone. It is part of a narrative arc, embedded within routines, lifestyles, and emotional journeys. This is no longer an endorsement; it is integration.

Analysing the scroll behaviour

To truly understand Instagram’s impact on consumer behaviour, we must look beyond marketing frameworks and into the psychology of scrolling itself. Scrolling is not a passive action, it is often an active emotional strategy. People scroll to self-soothe, to escape, to daydream, to feel connected, or to quieten their mind. And in these emotionally porous moments, brand messages enter more gently, more deeply. The consumer isn’t necessarily thinking; she’s feeling. And if the product matches the feeling, it finds acceptance.

This has given rise to a subtle but powerful shift: marketing now needs to be mood-sensitive, not just message-driven.

Design is the first hook

Instagram is also a deeply visual space. This means that the way a product looks—its colour palette, its packaging, the way it sits in a flatlay—matters more than ever. Visual appeal is no longer about shelf presence; it is about screen presence.

This has led to a boom in ‘Instagram-first’ brand building, where products are designed to perform in the scroll. But while this creates immediate engagement, it also sets a higher bar for retention. Because once the scroll moves on, what remains? This is where product efficacy must match the promise of aesthetics. The beautiful lie is no longer enough. If the product doesn’t deliver, there is always another reel waiting to take its place.

Rethinking the brand journey

The traditional linear, funnel model—awareness, interest, desire, action—no longer holds in its original form. Instead, we are now in an era of continuous, fluid engagement. A consumer may encounter a brand across ten different moments before acting. They may save a reel, DM a post to a friend, see it in a creator’s story, read a comment thread, and finally make a purchase, not through the brand’s website, but via an influencer’s affiliate link.

A brand’s role, then, is not just to push the message but to create enough presence in the ecosystem so that desire accumulates gently, steadily, and naturally.

What it means for marketers

It means we must let go of certainty—of control, of the idea that we are in charge of the consumer journey. Instead, we must build for relevance in the moments in between. We must create brand worlds that feel intuitive, not intrusive. Products must show up in real routines, not just branded ones. Messaging must be responsive to mood, not just mapped to consumer segments. Above all, we must remember: that Instagram doesn’t change what consumers want. It changes when, why, and how they decide to want it.

Closing thought

In a post-scroll world, brands must do more than advertise. They must embed themselves into the rhythm of everyday digital life.

Because in the end, it’s not just the product that matters, but how it appears, how it feels, and how seamlessly it fits into the story the consumer is already telling herself. And if done right, she doesn’t just buy the product. She buys into the possibility it represents.

— Rutu Mody-Kamdar- Founder of Jigsaw Brand Consultants.