You can be a millionaire, if you know how to schedule Instagram posts.
(Ah, a bit exaggerated I suppose, but that’s totally possible and has been done!)
Or maybe, the prospect of hundreds, if not thousands of new followers and engagements sounds more alluring to you?
If you’ve ever thought of scheduling Instagram posts, or have wondered of its benefits, you’re in for a treat.
Throughout this article, I’ll walk you through the exact steps (which are no more than 5-clicks at best) of scheduling Instagram posts.
But before the “how”, let’s talk a bit of the “why”?
Table of Contents
Benefits of Scheduling Instagram Posts in 2024
Long story short, it’ll help grow your Instagram account exponentially. Which, in turn, will help you make millions of dollars, buy that island, a Jet and a plot on Mars.
While I admit that’s extreme exaggeration, it’s not an “impossible” thought though. Did you know Kylie Jenner gets paid $1.2million/ Instagram post!
Okay, Let’s come back to the real world.
On a very practical note, the very core-benefit of scheduling Instagram posts is “Account growth”.
By “growth”, I mean growth in the number of followers, engagement on the posts, visibility in the feed, and brand-value.
But that’s a pretty broad way of putting it.
Let’s talk of the actual effects that scheduling Instagram posts has?
1. Automation
The number one reason I believe why you should schedule your Instagram posts is automation.
As you go through this piece, you’ll see different reasons why scheduling your posts is a good strategy.
But, at the end of the day, what you’re achieving is automation.
You may be at the beach, in a meeting, or sleeping. But, your content goes out exactly when it needs to, without you having to lift a finger.
2. Save time – Post more.
This really is the no-brainer.
It’s much easier to schedule 5 posts/day, than having to manually post 5 times a day. Don’t you agree?
By scheduling your posts all at once, you’re saving yourself time on multiple fronts.
For starters, you only have to click once to automate Instagram posts.
Then, there’s something what I call the “productive hour”. Every day, or week, there are times when you’re most creative and productive.
On those days, you accomplish tasks in fractions of their normal time-requirement.
So, by sitting down on one particular day, and scheduling all your posts during this “productive hour” saves you hours of time.
3. More Direct Likes, Followers, Visibility and Engagement
Schedule your posts =Double your “growth”.
Instagram’s notorious algorithm is ill-known for curbing visibility. Only a fraction of your followers see your post in their feed.
However, by simple logic, the more posts you put out, the more engagement you may potentially gain.
Let’s crunch some numbers? According to a report from Social Media Today, posting 3 times a day results in 2.2x more engagement on your posts.
(Source)
4. Maintain Consistency
I suppose you’ve heard of Neil Patel? He’s one of the most successful Digital Marketers on the planet.
In his article on Forbes, he clearly maintains that “consistency” is key.
You can post any number of times you wish a day. It can be 1, it can be 50. But, you’ve got to be able to “maintain” that consistency.
If you don’t, you lose followers, engagement, and overall “growth”. Using an Instagram scheduler like Combin Scheduler help you remain consistent, even on your busy days.
5. Beat Your Competitors
According to this report from Statista, bigger brands post nearly 28x a month. That translates to a nearly 1 post /day.
Instagram, alike all other spheres of life is extremely competitive.
If you post less than others, people get less chances to engage with you, this in turn leads to them getting lesser content from you in the future.
On the other hand, posting more has a chance that you’ll be seen more than your competitors.
Now, I suppose not all of us have the time to curate, create, and publish content every single day.
That’s one of the reasons why you should schedule your Instagram posts.
6. Post on the Most Engaging Day and Time.
It may sound bizarre, but the exact same content and exact same efforts and research for that content may yield completely polar results simply depending on the “day and time” of when you posted that content!
It’s real because, people aren’t as flush with cash at the end of the month, as they are in the first week, are they?
Also, people feel differently at 3 P.M in the noon, as compared to 9 P.M in the evening.
Now, I always say there’s no “universal” best time for Instagram. Rather, it depends on your industry, niche and user-demographic.
This screenshot from Hubspot should get you a general idea:
With an Instagram scheduler, you can schedule content which will be pushed out exactly at that “sweet moment of most engagement”.
How to Schedule Instagram Posts?
Enough with the knowledge, that probably most of you skipped. (That’s fine!)
So, I was strolling the Internet for an Instagram post scheduler. Found more than a few.
However, not all of those won me over. One of the few tools which did was Combin Scheduler. You can download Combin Scheduler if you wish to. (It’s free.)
Once you have, using it to schedule Instagram posts seems extremely easy and straight-forward.
Simply, launch the application and click on “Add New Post” at the bottom of the screen.
The next screen then lets us personalize each post. Let’s break it down?
- Here, you simply enter the caption. Throw in a couple #hashtags if you would.
- Enter a link to bio.
- Combin Scheduler allows adding locations as well. You can either type one manually, or choose from a map.
- And finally, enter the exact date and time when you want your post to go live.
- On the bottom-right corner of the screen, you’d notice it even allows tagging users!
- Simply click on the “create” button to schedule the post.
I don’t suppose there’s any “learning-curve” here, huh?
Anyone who uses Instagram should easily be able to schedule Instagram posts with ease, don’t you agree?
Optionally, if you click on the “Templates” button on the post-creator, it automatically suggests a number of pre-written templates you can choose from.
One-click, and it’s embedded into your post.
How to Schedule Instagram Stories
So, I’ve answered the question –“ Can you schedule Instagram posts?” But, Instagram isn’t only about posts, eh? There are “stories” as well.
In fact, redirecting traffic from your story to your latest post is trending these last couple months.
Combin Scheduler does allow scheduling stories. Simply click on “Stories” from the left-sidebar, and then select “+ Add new story”.
The next screen simply lets us queue multiple stories.
We can then easily set the date & time, a bio and click on “create”.
How to Schedule Instagram Reposts
One of the reasons I went with Combin Scheduler from the half a dozen other tools is it allows scheduled reposting.
The interface is identical to scheduling a new post.
- Launch Combin Scheduler, and click either on “Posts” or “Stories”.
- Again, click either on “Add new post” or “Add new story” depending on your previous choice.
- On the next screen, click on the “Repost” button from the top-bar.
- Paste the link of the post you’d like reposted.
The caption is auto-captured from the previous post (including the #hashtags). However, it can be fully edited.
- Fill in the location, link to bio, and set a date/time for the content to go live.
- Click on the “create button”.
Done!
Why Combin Scheduler?
I’m confident you now know how to schedule Instagram posts (and, the why).
But, why Combin Scheduler? What made Combin Scheduler win the Instagram scheduler race? Aren’t there other tools which let us schedule Instagram posts?
Well, there sure are.
But for me personally, a number of key-points stood out. Let me share those with you:
- Free (permanently).*
- Extremely easy to use.
- Multiple user-accounts supported.
- Advanced “Proxy” feature.
- Offers a live-preview, before the content goes live, of how it’ll look on your profile.
- Tagging feature.
- Location feature
- Supports emoticons in scheduled captions.
- Auto template-suggestions.
- Basic image-editing features (crop/rotate/resize).
- Supports stories and repost scheduling.
*Paid plans do exist, but are completely optional.
Comparatively, I just couldn’t find a tool with all these features, for free. They sure may exist, and I just may be lazy.
Do (very) frequent posts hurt your account?
The one question I’d like to answer is the negative impact (if any) of posting too frequently.
Scheduling Instagram posts in most cases boosts post-frequency. However, this does not affect your account in any negative sense.
According to a Techcrunch article, there’s no downranking users purely based on post-frequency.
So, can you schedule posts on Instagram? Absolutely. Schedule away! Also, do let me know if you think any other tool except Combin Scheduler can help me schedule Instagram posts.
