How to improve Instagram engagement through timely posts.

Creating a strategy for your business’s Instagram account.

If you’re looking to grow your business with social media marketing on Instagram, a scheduling strategy can boost your engagement, grow your followers, and help you connect with customers. But there’s more to successfully using Instagram than simply finding the right day of the week to post images. Success depends on optimizing your content and posting frequency, and how you utilize analytics tools.

Follow these steps to create an Instagram workflow and scheduling strategy that will deliver high engagement numbers and help you grow your business.
 

Step 1: Determine how often to post on Instagram.

When structuring your social media scheduling strategy, it’s important to balance quality and quantity. In the world of Instagram content, quality trumps quantity every time. If you’re overly ambitious and try to create a post every weekday, the overall caliber of your content could decline. But if you focus only on quality, you might not be posting enough.

Step 2: Research the best times to post.

Once you’ve zeroed in on how much time you can dedicate to crafting Instagram content, it’s time to start researching the optimal time to post it. Finding the right time to post for your audience is the best thing a business can do to increase engagement. The Instagram algorithm prioritizes new content on people’s feeds, so if you post when a majority of your audience is online, your chances of appearing on their feeds increases. Posting at peak times boosts your reach and can result in more likes.

Research your specific audience on Instagram.

Because every account has a unique audience in different time zones, the perfect time to post will vary from business to business. Understanding your followers is key to being successful. Maybe they browse Instagram with their morning coffee, during the lunch hour, or throughout the workday. If you have a business account, you can access Instagram Insights, an analytics platform native to the app. This offers up data on your followers’ behaviors and actions. You can find their location, ages, and when they’re active online. From here, it’s a simple step to build your content calendar and posting schedule around those specific times.

Experiment with different posting times.

If you don’t immediately find success, try testing different posting times using an Instagram scheduling tool, and keep track of your progress. If early morning doesn’t work well, try different peak times. After a few weeks of posting, see if timing significantly affected your engagement rates. You may find that certain kinds of posts perform better at different times.
 

Step 3: Create and schedule Instagram posts.

Make the most of your audience research by creating and scheduling your content in advance. Planning ahead ensures you have quality content ready at the best posting time and gives you space to craft creative and thoughtful posts.

Craft an Instagram aesthetic.

When creating and scheduling your Instagram content, it’s important to look at your posting schedule as a grid and not as standalone posts. When your followers click on your profile, they’ll see your content in columns and rows, so be sure to consider the overall look and feel you want. All of your business’s content should work together. One way to make sure everyone on your team is using the same color palettes and style guides is with Adobe Creative Cloud for teams. Creative Cloud Libraries allow your team to share assets, collaborate more easily, and ensure your brand is delivering a cohesive style.

Write better Instagram captions.

The key to a great Instagram caption is inspiring your followers to take a specific action. Whether you want them to shop for your product or click the link in your bio, a creative and clear caption can make it happen, resulting in higher engagement. Coming up with interesting captions can be hard, especially if you’re writing them on the fly. Instead, plan all your captions for the week at once when you’re feeling creative.

Add hashtags to optimize your Instagram post.

Hashtags are an effective way to increase the reach of your Instagram posts, but be sure to use them strategically. Copying and pasting the same giant list of hashtags at the end of every caption isn’t a good idea — don’t forget, quality over quantity. Instead, do some research and see what hashtags your audience and your competitors are using. Consider creating your own funny, branded hashtags as well. General, universally used hashtags can make your content easier to find and unique hashtags can grab people’s attention.

Step 4: Analyze your metrics to improve engagement rates.

Your Instagram scheduling strategy will evolve over time. You may need to change tactics or creative styles regularly to keep your content fresh, but every adjustment should be strategic and based on facts and data. Regularly check your Instagram analytics tools and create a monthly report to track your progress over time. With regular reporting you can more easily see what works for your business’s page and confidently improve your strategy for the future.

With creative social media content, a strategic posting schedule, and structured reporting, your business’s Instagram engagement is sure to improve. But don’t stop there. Remember, your Instagram strategy is just one part of a complete content marketing effort. Give your business a leg up by crafting a full content marketing strategy to guide content creation across all digital channels.

Creating standout social content takes creativity and the right tools. Consider using Creative Cloud for teams — a membership that gives your team access to all the apps they need to quickly create eye-catching GIFs, social assets, and stunning photos.

This article is adapted from Taylor Loren's "Optimizing Your Instagram Scheduling Strategy: Everything to Know Before You Post."