Your Instagram grid doesn’t have to feel like a confusing Rubik’s cube. We’re here to help show you how to build the perfect Instagram grid and explain why planning apps might just be the answer to making your Instagram account look professional and cohesive.
The elusive, perfect insta grid becomes much more achievable with a professional tool that marketing companies, digital agencies, social media managers, digital strategists and virtual assistants are all using.
We’re talking about planning apps.
What are planning apps? They’re applications designed specifically for social media, allowing you to design and lay out your social media feed with strategy and in a visually appealing way.
Many of the planning apps have the ability to publish posts to multiple social media platforms however this blog focuses on Instagram only; looking at how you can visually curate your Instagram grid ahead of time to create the perfect visual layout.
I know you’d love to dive into the planning part right away but before you dive into posting pretty pictures, you will also need to have a clear understanding about ‘why’ you are posting on social media. Have you ever given this much thought?
And if you have already considered your ‘why’, my best tip is to make sure your posts always point back to it.
The strongest social media strategies always have a clear focus on their why as well as the outcomes they wish to achieve. They intentionally utilise social media as a marketing tool to ensure it works to their advantage.
And before we go any further can you promise me you’ll never post on social media just for the sake of posting.
If you’re not sure what your why is, consider your business values and what type of content you are wanting to share. This will lead you closer to your answer.
For example, is your goal to be educational, to convert sales, to nurture, excite, delight, inspire, include, entertain or whatever else it might be….
Whatever it is, knowing your why for showing up on social media is the basis of a strong social media strategy and will help you ensure every post looks and feels right with your brand.
Once you have a clear why you are ready to plan your images so let’s choose a planning app.
The planning apps we’ve tried and tested are:
- Preview
- Feed Preview
- Garny
- Planoly
Preview – is free, easy to use and you can drag images around easily.
Feed Preview – is free but it’s worth noting if you have a large number of images in the folder you can’t drag images around as easily as ‘Preview’.
Garny – is free and you don’t need to connect your Instagram account to use it. You can drag images around easily even if you have a large number of images in the folder.
Planoly – is free and is visually pleasing but you are restricted to the number of images you can have (30 per month).
Once you’ve chosen your planning app, you can begin the layout process with those famous 9 squares as your blank canvas.
My best advice is to drop in a few photos and begin playing around which will give you a feel for strategically laying out social media images.
When you have a few images next to one another on the planning grid, ask yourself these essential questions…
- Are the images you’ve placed next to one another cohesive?
- Is there too much of the one type of content placed next to each other?
- Is it too busy?
- Do the colours work well?
- Do the fonts work well?
You want your feed to look like a family (similar and familiar) so when choosing your images pick the ones that work well together to enhance and reinforce your brand.
Having all the images looking cohesive is a skill I know you can achieve easily with the help of a planning app. Which app will you try first?
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– Sarah