We all know that InstaStories are the hot new thing with Instagram these days. It is the best way to engage with your ideal clients and start forming relationships in your DMs. Remembering to show up live, though, can be a real pain.
So how do we go about planning out that content and posting consistently to our Instastories?
I have a brief walkthrough for you on exactly how to schedule your Instagram Stories using Planoly.
creating graphics for your stories
The first thing you want to do is create the different graphics and videos for your stories. To do this, you will use Instagram itself.
I love creating the basic graphics in Canva or starting with a template. If you’re looking for some inspiration or a starting point, grab my InstaStories Canva Template set.
To create your graphics inside of Instagram, log in to the app and go to where you would post the stories in real time. You are going to create the story slide the same way you normally would, but instead of posting it, you click the download button in the upper right corner.
adding hashtags to your story slides
One ninja trick I like to use while putting my InstaStories content together is embedding hashtags directly to the story graphics.
This will allow people who are following those hashtags to watch your story and then fall in love with your content!
You can even hide the hashtags behind an image or make them so small that no one really notices them (use your fingers to “pinch” the set of hashtags).
If you’re having trouble coming up with hashtags, check out my free guide to 30 hashtags that aren’t overused!
scheduling your story slides in planoly
Once you have your Story graphic saved to your camera roll on your phone, you can now open up Planoly and start uploading the images and videos, using the Stories button at the top of the screen when you login to Planoly.
Note: if you’re using the free version of Planoly, you can only upload and schedule out images. If you’d like a free trial, click here.
Once you’ve uploaded your images, they will appear with a ‘U” in the upper left corner. This means it hasn’t been scheduled yet.
Click on the image and use the toggle down in the bottom right corner to schedule the Instagram Story for a time and day that you feel like is best for you.
Planoly will allow you to see the Stories that have been scheduled and those that aren’t.
If creating content for Instagram in general is time consuming, I suggest checking out this tutorial. I walk you through how to create a wonderful puzzle collage in this video! Check it out!