It may seem quite overwhelming just how many Instagram apps and tools there are available to help enhance your Social Media presence. After a lot of trial and error with different programs and apps, I now have a great list of go to tools that I work with on a regular basis to help stream line my Instagram. While using Instagram can be extremely time consuming, with a great process in place there is no reason why you should need to spend more than a few hours a week on your Instagram feed.
Here are a few helpful tools and apps that are worth checking out:
Scheduling:
There are so many amazing scheduling apps now available for Instagram that will post for you and help you plan out your feed. They do range quite a bit in price so it is worth doing your research. I have found that they all seem to have slightly different features so it pays to do a few free trials to work out which format is going to work best for your business. My go to scheduling program at present is Later. What I like about Later is that you can crop/edit your images through the app and you can save commonly used captions/hashtags.
Instagram Stories:
You don’t necessarily need to be using tools/apps for your Instagram stories but if you do feel like you want to give this a more professional look/format then there are some great programs around to help you put together a beautiful format for your stories that reflects your brand. Canva is a wonderful tool for Story templates, where you can easily put your own take on the graphics by adding in borders, your brand colours, text, logo etc. If you would like to put together a cohesive story of a wedding or event you have done consider using the Unfold app which gives you access to beautiful borders, different photo layouts and stunning scripted fonts.
Linktree:
For most of us in the wedding industry we have lots of different pages on our websites that we would like to draw traffic too. If for example you have a blog that you are promoting, recent work that you have added to your Portfolio, or a contact page on your website that you refer to on Instagram – a great way for your audience to easily find what you are referencing in your posts is to add Linktree to your bio. Linktree offers users the ability to add in multiple url destinations within one easy bio link.
Hashtag tools:
Hashtags are such a great way to help get your account and images noticed on Instagram. If you are struggling to work out exactly which hashtags are best for your business then it pays to do a bit of research. There are some wonderful tools around like Ingramer where you can put in your image, url or keyword that you want to generate hashtags for. It pays to use hashtags that are not overly popular or generic. Keep a close eye or what is working best for your business by reviewing your analytics regularly.
Image editing and graphics:
A few of my favourite go to apps for editing images would have to be VSCO and Lightroom CC. While Lightroom does come at a cost and can be a little confusing to start with there are lots of great options around for affordable presets you can use to edit your images with. This can really help enhance your images to give them a more professional look. Canva is also a wonderful free tool for creating graphics and quotes for your Instagram feed.
Instagram is THE platform where couples are discovering their wedding suppliers. If your wedding business isn’t on there, it needs to be! Luckily we have created a handy mini course — Instagram 101 for Wedding Pros in which we share the strategies we’ve used to build the Academy Instagram from 1,343 followers to over 15K in under a year. Find out more about the course and enrol here.
ABOUT THE AUTHORFormer Creative Director and named one of Australia’s Top 25 Wedding Stylists, Lisa Macale is an integral member of our Academy Tutor team. Lisa is passionate about mentoring students as they make the transition from student to successful business owner. She now also offers wedding business coaching via www.lisamacale.com
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