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Do you wish you knew how to find the best Instagram filters for stories and live video? Recently I did a live video on Instagram and used a black and white filter. If you’d like to learn how to use filters and more importantly, how to find filters you really like, stay tuned for today’s episode and I’ll share why you may want to use filters, as well as tips for your bio link and Instagram captions. All this and more as I answer my Instagram Pro community member’s questions.
*This episode contains either affiliate links or links to my products. Should you choose to purchase, the show will go on! Woo hoo!
Resources
Get the Hashtag Formula Toolkit
Check out Later.com
Check out Linktree
Listen to Ep. 58: 7 tips for repurposing Instagram stories
Listen to Ep. 61: Combining Instagram and email marketing in 5 smart ways
Listen to Ep. 64: Building A YouTube Channel From Repurposed Content
Best Instagram filters for stories and where to find them
Christa from @doanewthing –
Let your personality shine through. I like to be funny and my followers enjoy that so I sometimes use funny filters in IG The most recent example is the pink square filter that gives you four time lapse photos. I held it down, made 4 different crazy faced and captioned it with, “How I feel about my day”. (Lots of response.) This is what you want – organic dms that stem from evoked emotions.
The majority of filters are humorous but you can also search for flattering filters or even cause filters. To do this, open up stories and scroll filters all the way far left to to the search bar. Tap it to browse effects, and you’ll see categories at the top. Scroll left to see all – Instagram, selfies, love, color & light, etc. tap one of them to view examples of what people have done with that filter. Or if you know what you’re specifically looking for, tap the search bar at top right and type it in. Recently, I went live in black and white. I used the search bar to find a black and white filter, tapped “try it” at far left, and then hit the download arrow at bottom right to save it right with my existing filters. When I went back to my “normal” setting, it was sitting right there with all my other filters. This is a pro tip for finding the best Instagram filters for stories and live video!
How important is it to have a Linktree and what should you have on it?
Jamie from @expeditionmarriage
Jamie mentioned a software that works with your link in bio to drive traffic to a specific website, email opt in, or something else. There are many options available and one of them is Linktree – spelled, linktr.ee on the interwebs. The free version gives you a link to sit in your bio. This link always stays the same, and you can have up to 5 separate categories. How this works is, when followers hit that link in bio, it opens up a landing page with up to 5 different buttons which you can label, such as “today’s blog post”, “my etsy shop”, “Grab your checklist”, etc. And each one holds that specific link.
It’s important to have something like this because chances are, you don’t drive your traffic to one specific sight unless you’re a large, established company.
For instance, I drive traffic to my blog, my podcast, my products, my coaching sales page, and my opt ins. Sometimes I send traffic to my affiliate products. The software I used is called Later.com and it also has a free link version. I use the paid version because I can have as many links as I want. If you go to my link in bio and hit it, you can scroll down through my feed, select any photo, and it will take you to the specific link I mentioned.
I also have a button at the top left that says, “7-Day Instagram Story Challenge”, which receives lots of traffic and btw if you haven’t taken that challenge and you want to learn more about how to present your stories, use filters, and add gifs to suite your personality, I will interact with you through that challenge. To access this,
either follow me on Instagram @ruthiegray.mom and hit my link in bio to access that challenge, or go to my website at ruthiegray.mom and you’ll see the challenge there.
To answer your question, Jamie, unless you are driving traffic to just one resource or website always, I do advise you to use software like linktree or later.com. I will leave the links for both these in the shownotes!
Is there an ideal length for IG captions?
Dawn @dawnklinge
Dawn is talking about the words we put in our feed posts underneath the photo. The best thing you can do for captions is vary the length. Experts tell us this. Stagger long form, short, and medium to switch it up.
This strategy works well. The reason you want long form sometimes, also refer to as “mini blogging”, is to keep people on your page longer. Instagram recognizes when this happens and rewards you by pushing out your content and showing it more.
The reason you DON’T want to always have long form content is because not everyone wants to read a book every day. There simply isn’t time. And some will give up on your content and engage less if you regularly post long form content.
Medium form content works well when you want to just get a quick point across. And short gives people kind of a sigh of relief because if they’re trying to engage with you (because we all know engagement on other’s content is important to receive engagement on our own), they can quickly scan your quote or short caption or even maybe 3 laughing/crying emoji’s and move on. Switch it up! Try this out and let me know how it goes!
So there you have it – how to find the best instagram filters, the scoop on link in bio software like linktree and later.com, and great advice on caption length. Which tip was your favorite? Send me a dm and I’ll share it in my stories and tag you!
Before we go, I have two more member questions and here they are:
Melanie @melaniemredd – What’s the very best way to find fabulous hashtags for every kind post? Easy, good, powerful ways to find them.
Wren @friendsofafeather – How do you find the right hashtags for your Instagram content?
When Melanie and Wren asked these questions, they didn’t know I already had a podcast session planned and taped on hashtags!
So the first thing to do is Go listen to episode 8 called How to use hashtags on Instagram because that will answer questions like how large should they be post-wise and how they should relate to your graphic. Then, go to my show notes and pick up my Hashtag Formula Toolkit! It’s my webinar that walks you through exactly how to find the correct hashtags for your niche, using live case studies and you’ll see how I walk them through how to detect banned hashtags and and dig deeper into analytics to find the best hashtags for you to use.
The revelations these webinar participants made blew their minds and these strategies will blow your mind too!
Thanks for listening to the Instagram pro member Q&A. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast and keep listening for details on how to join my Pro Community membership. I’ll see you next time but for now, remember to stay consistent on Instagram!