Transcripts
1. Introduction: Hello, my name is Come welcome damn MCI and welcome to my scotia. A course about how you can post more often on Instagram without burning out. In the coming lessons, we'll cover the different types of content that you can post on Instagram, as well as the different tools that you can use to post more regularly.
2. The Course Project: By the end of this course, you should be able to come up with your own content calendar. So for the course project, come up with a month long plan for your Instagram, this plan can be physical or digital, broad, or as detailed as you need it to be, whatever will be most helpful for you. Do that. Once your plan is done, take a screenshot of it or a photo and upload it to the projects tab along with any questions that you might have.
3. Types of Instagram Content: First, let's talk about the different posts that you can upload to Instagram. For this course, we're just going to talk about the different media that you can upload to Instagram. And in a future course, we'll talk about the different genres of posts that you can have. You can have portraits, illustrations or text posts, or you can have videos. A portrait could be a photo of yourself or you and your friends or your pets. For most people, these are the types of posts that do the best on Instagram. I suspect this is because social media is meant to be social. People want to get to know you, a person that they can relate to rather than another big corporations that they don't really know. Illustrations and texts posts are ideal for when you want to share more information than will fit in a caption. Illustrations are great for when you want to explain more complex topics and texts. Posts like quotes or statistics are great for when you want to integrate outside sources into your content. Videos on Instagram offer even more space for extended storytelling. On Instagram, you can post videos via regular Feed post, you can post them via reals or IPTV. You can even post videos on your story. Each of these options serves a slightly different purpose, but all of them can be stored on your profile. So let's go over each one of these so that you can pick out the ones that are most relevant to you. If you'd like to upload a video on Instagram that's between 360 seconds. You can upload this video as a feed Post. But at the time of recording this course, reals are still very popular and I would recommend that you just take that feed, post and post it as a real. Using the reals editor will also allow you to add text to your video without going into any other external apps. Videos are between 15 seconds in one hour, then you can use IG TV if you'd like an easy way to host a live stream for your community, then Instagram Live is for you. At the end of your Instagram Live, you'll be given an option to download the live to your camera roll. Downloading the live will not download comments or likes or any of that. It will just download the video and then you can take that video and upload it back to your profile as an IG TB makes sure that if you want to download your Instagram lives, that you do so right after the life ends, because once you exit that screen, it will not come back again and you will not be able to replay your live. The last video option that Instagram has is stories. Stories are great for really casual and quick video. And they will be available for your followers for 24 hours. But if you would like to view your Instagram story after the 24-hour period, you can now go to archives which is under settings to view any of your stories. And from there you can reshared them or download them or do whatever you would like with them. You also have the option of highlighting stories, which we'll save them for everybody to see on your profile, depending on what your content is about and what your personality is, you will likely find yourself drawn to one of these particular media. If you're unsure about what you might like or what might work out, recommend trying them all. You never know what might click. You can also go to the profiles of brands and creators that you love and already follow to see what they do and what works for them. Because that might also work for you.
4. Reposting Content: As you brainstorm all the different things that you want to create and share with your community. You should know that it is okay to reuse content. If you posted an idea a year ago, it is okay to share it today because it's likely that a lot of your community members that are following you now haven't seen that idea from you before, or they've forgotten with a tweak here and there of the caption or of the graphic opposed from a year ago can be made relevant for today. For example, here's a Feed post, my Instagram circa 2014. I don't know how long this graphic to make, but I'm sure that I put a lot of effort into creating it. Around this time. I knew very little about design and had about 200 followers six years later. And not only do I know how to make better graphics at 600 plus followers, the majority of the community I'm around now denied even know my Instagram exists in 2014. This is the perfect opportunity to take something old and spin it into something new. With this new graphic, I kept the same quote and color scheme, but modernized everything and my caption and be sure to relate it to life as it stands in 2021 verses 2014. And other type of content that you can reshare is content from other creators and brands. When you reassure other people's content, make sure that you give them credit and get permission when you need to. Sharing content from related brands can help extend your audience and reach out to people who aren't currently following you and re-sharing content from your customers are audience members, can be a really fun way to get engagement up and help everybody feel like they're a part of what you're building.
5. Creating a Content Calendar: Now that you know about all the different types of posts that you can post on Instagram, it is time to start creating your content calendar. Now, this isn't as complicated as it sounds. A content calendar is simply a plan for what you're going to post and when you're going to post it. Content calendars can be made in physical calendars or digital calendars on Trello, on Google Docs, spreadsheets, whatever works for you to keep you organized. The first thing that you want to do to create a constant calendar is make a list of all the posts that you'd like to have on your feed. And then from there you can allocate different days for each post. For example, if you want to have portraits and illustrations, and you can say, okay, a Mondays I'm going to post portraits and on Wednesdays I'm going to post illustrations. Alternatively, you could say that on Mondays I went to pose reels and on Wednesdays, I want to post IG TVs or I want to post regular feed posts. Or you can do a combination of the May 2 be on Mondays you want to post portrait feed posts and on Thursdays, you want to post illustration reels. And you can alternate throughout your month, throughout your weeks like that. Once you do that and you have a broad level view of all the different posts that you want to have on your feed. You can go back and make your plan more specific. So instead of just saying, oh, I want to post an illustration on Monday, what illustration are you going to post on Monday? I want to post a real okay, what is that really going to be about? So you're going to go through and make detailed notes on each of those days of what you want to post. If you're feeling extra motivated, you can even go through and write the captions and hashtags that you would like to use for each one of these posts. Doing this will help alleviate the stress that comes with waking up one day and realizing that you're supposed to post on Instagram and you have no idea what you're going to do. You'll already have a plan. You might even already have captions in hashtags and all you need to do is go in and post the content.
6. Using Templates: And the same way that having a schedule or a content calendar, it can help reduce the amount of mental energy you need to plan posts. Having templates can help reduce the amount of energy it takes to execute on those posts. These templates can come from a tool like Canva, which has a free option and a lot of templates to work with. Or you can make them yourself on Photoshop or another design platform. Or you can hire a designer to make custom templates for you. You can decide that there is a certain design that you like to use for your texts post, or a certain format that you like for your reals. Using templates will allow you to spend less time worrying about the aesthetic of your feet because you all ready, have it figured out?
7. Using a Scheduling Tool: The next game changer that you can adopt to save time and energy on Instagram is a scheduler. Well, the scheduler, you're able to automate posts for weeks and weeks on end. Some schedulers even have a feature where you can see a mock-up of your feed. So instead of having to imagine if posts will work well together or if this picture should go out this Monday or next Monday or next year, you can see all of your posts lined up looking beautiful and you can move them around until you're happy. I have personally used buffer HootSuite and plan only. Each of these platforms has a free limited use option that you can use to see if the platform is for you. And there are many other schedulers out there that you can test out. Buffer is great if you want a pretty basic intuitive option to try out. Plan only has that feature that I was talking about earlier where you can see your whole grid. Hootsuite is a little bit more confusing to use than the past too that I just mentioned, but it's great if you have multiple accounts or multiple campaigns that you're trying to keep track of. If you're not ready to try out a scheduling tool, that's all right. I would still recommend that you start planning out your captions and hashtags that ahead of time using your notes app or a notebook.
8. Take Advantage of Creative Sparks: The last tip I have for you today is take advantage of creative sparks. If today after watching this course, you're super excited to create answered I'm content. Go take lots of photos, right? Lots of captions, write down all your ideas and store them for later. Because no matter how much you plan, no matter how much you schedule, there will be a day when you don't want to engage or don't even want to think about your social media profile. And that is okay. And it's perfectly normal. And if you're using a scheduler on those days post will still go out without any additional energy on your part.
9. Conclusion: You may easily end of this course. Good job. I hope that this course has given you tips and tools that you can use to make creating Instagram content a little bit easier and a little bit more sustainable. If you have any questions about anything that I mentioned in this course, feel free to leave them in the discussions tab, and I'll be sure to get to them. And don't forget to post your content calendar, whether it's broad or super specific, whether it's a screenshot of plant only or buffer or HootSuite. In the Projects tab, I look forward to seeing them and I'll see you in my next course.
Carmel Kundai Makaya, Social Media | Freelance Career
