The vast majority of social media professionals utilize Instagram scheduling without giving it a second thought because it is an excellent time-saving tool. When you make your posts in advance and then use a piece of software to post them automatically at the time that you choose, this is known as schedule posting.
Automation on Instagram, on the other hand, is not nearly as beneficial, if not downright harmful. To artificially inflate your stats, entails paying for bots to like or comment on posts made by unknown strangers. It should not come as much of a surprise that automation does not live up to its claims. This is not only detrimental to the relationships that your brand has with its partners and audiences, but it is also typically a kind of swindle.
When it comes to its ongoing efforts to combat boots, spam, and scams, Instagram has shown to be extremely effective. Consequently, in this day and age, it is not only unproductive to spend money on questionable activities, but it is also rather challenging to do so. For example, in the most recent automation experiment that we conducted, the services that we attempted to acquire frequently just did not work.
One positive aspect is that there are a great number of reputable solutions that make use of automation to assist you in breaking free from the hamster wheel of jobs that are repetitious. For ideas, take a look at our compilation of social media automation tools that adhere to ethical standards
What are the best practices for scheduling posts on Instagram?
If you are prepared to take the plunge and become extremely efficient with your posting routines, the following advice will assist you in remaining one step ahead of the competition.
You will be reminded to publish to Instagram using a push notification that will be sent to your phone at the appropriate moment. It is important to keep in mind that the procedure of scheduling your Instagram Stories is generally the same, regardless of the type of account you have.
In some ways, the procedure for posting can be described as follows. The Hootsuite app will handle the majority of the work for you, but you will still need to open Instagram, paste your caption in, choose your photo, and go through the rest of the steps. There is no difficult mental effort involved, but you should set aside five minutes to double-verify that everything is in order. To maximize your Instagram scheduling, you should avoid scheduling your posts too far in advance. The world is changing at an ever-increasing rate, which is the most important thing that we have realized in the year 2020.
When it comes to scheduling social media posts, going further than a week in advance might sometimes start to raise the likelihood that something will go wrong. By sharing something that is not in line with your brand’s values, you run the risk of creating a social media disaster for your company. If a crisis occurs, it is possible that you will be required to completely halt your posting calendar and instead rely on your social channels to communicate through the crisis. As a piece of advice, make sure you keep your finger on the pulse and remain agile.
Aim to avoid appearing spammy when you are using Instagram Scheduling.
The wonder of Instagram scheduling has indeed made it possible for you to raise the number of posts you make without compromising the quality of those posts. Should you, however? The answer, in a nutshell, is “maybe.” The lengthy response is “Maybe if you can maintain constant quality at that pace for a large period.”
Nevertheless, the most important factor in achieving high engagement rates is consistency, not frequency. Keep in mind that the Instagram algorithm places a high priority on maintaining positive relationships: if your followers are actively engaging with the stuff you post, the algorithm will display more of that content to its followers. It is possible to upload and arrange your visuals within the content library of Hootsuite. How do you organize the stuff that you share on social media? Google Drive, Dropbox, or both? Do you have a few folders on your desktop that are labelled “misc. social”? If you choose a content library that is specialized to your needs, you will have access to tags, permissions, and a plethora of metadata that will assist you in locating.
You Should Edit a lot, for Instagram Preparation
Regardless of how busy you are, you should always make sure to give the copy a new appearance before it is published officially. For large teams that have a lot of moving pieces, an internal approval system that has multiple stages is perfect for preventing mistakes from being made.
Assess and make necessary adjustments for Instagram Scheduling
One of the most beneficial features of scheduling Instagram posts is that it allows you to take a step back and have a more complete viewpoint. Getting likes is what it is. What precisely is not working? You might even consider conducting some A/B testing and being mathematical about it. Once you have decided the Instagram analytics tool you want to use, you can get started.