5 Must-Have Apps for Instagram
If you're a boss babe, it's safe to assume that you are on Instagram. If you're not, stop reading this blog post and go set up your Instagram account! Over 70% of businesses are on Facebook, so if you're not, I bet your competitor is. More than 250 million active users view Instagram stories daily - exceeding Snapchat's active daily users. And these numbers are expected to grow in 2018.
The single best way to grow your Instagram account is to treat it like a business. You must be actively posting strong content and engaging with users. Instagram is a very saturated platform and it is too easy for your profile to get lost in the crowd.
These five apps will help you plan and edit your content, post at the right times, find and engage with followers, and more. You will make your life easier if you use these apps in addition to Instagram!
PLANOLY
Do you ever wonder how some Instagrammers get such beautiful, cohesive feeds? They use an Instagram planner! Planoly is my absolute favorite. It is a visual Instagram planner that lets you drag and drop your images around to see how they'll look in your feed.
You can write out your captions and schedule your posts ahead of time. I like to have my posts scheduled out at least a week in advance! Consistency is crucial for Instagram growth, so planning ahead of time will help you stick to a posting schedule.
THERE'S MORE. Planoly even has a library of free stock photos for you to use! And you can schedule your Instagram STORIES too. Literally you can have your entire Instagram scheduled in advance. Ahhhh-mazing.
Planoly has a hashtag list feature that allows you to save lists of hashtags and not have to type them all out every time you post an Instagram. I have lots of different categories of hashtags saved so I can quickly insert hashtags into any post!
You can view your analytics - see your top posts and track your growth via your number of likes, comments, and followers. View weekly, monthly, or yearly analytics. The comment management feature lets you view, like, and respond to comments right from the app.
And finally, Planoly is perfect for small business owners because it allows you to create a SHOPPABLE FEED! Imagine having your followers make a purchase straight from your Instagram post. Fabulous.
PRIME
You have probably heard tons of different theories as to what the best time to post on Instagram is. This is because there is a different "best time" for everyone. With the millions of users on Instagram, it wouldn't make sense that there is one specific time on one specific day of the week that will guarantee you get the most likes.
Prime is an app that analyzes your specific followers and tells you the "prime time" for you to post each day, down to the minute. They'll give you a list of suggested times to post each day and a graph showing when your followers are most active. It's nice to have Prime open while you are scheduling your posts on Planoly. And it's free!
LINKTREE
Linktree is the Instagram resource you have been waiting for. You know how you can only add one URL to your Insta bio? NOT ANYMORE, LADIES. With Linktree, you can add multiple links!
Instead of choosing which link is most important for Boss Babe Co's Instagram, we have this link: https://linktr.ee/bossbabeco. This pulls up several links that we have entered, including the website, the Facebook group, the resource guide, and the blog. If you get the premium version, you can even see which links are clicked on most. Pretty cool!
ICONOSQUARE
Iconosquare is the best app for tracking your analytics.
Here are the things you can track with Iconosquare:
Follower growth
Engagement score (percentage of followers that engage with you)
Hashtag performance (which hashtags are bringing you the most engagement)
Impact of filters on likes and comments (did you even know that was a thing?!)
How reachable your followers are
Locations of your followers
Best performing posts (most likes, most comments, most engaging)
Best performing post times
But Iconosquare has much more to offer than analytics. You can add three competitors and track their analytics too. You can view charts that show your analytics in comparison to theirs. If you are targeting the same audience, studying the competitors habits and altering yours can be very beneficial to your Instagram strategy.
You can also track hashtags the same way you can track competitors. Choose three hashtags and you can see how often they are used, the locations of the users who use them, and the growth history of the hashtag. It is a good way to decide which hashtags to use in your posts.
The comment tracker allows you to keep track on the unread comments on your posts. As your Instagram grows, it can become difficult to keep up with the comments on your Instagrams. But engaging with your followers is very important, so it is helpful to check the comment tracker every few days and see if there are any comments you missed.
Iconosquare has a feeds feature, automatically adding a feed with your media and a feed with the posts that you have liked. You can create more feeds, adding hashtags and users so you can view only the posts you want.
There is a scheduling feature that you can use if you do not use another Instagram planner.
The advanced media search is one of the coolest features in my humble opinion. You can search hashtags and filter them by: media type, number of likes, number of comments, number of followers, number of followings, number of user media, words/phrases in caption, mentions, and date. PRETTY PRETTY COOL. And you can track brands and influencers.
VSCO
There are thousands of photo editor apps. I've probably downloaded nearly 50 apps before finding one I really like. VSCO is a photo editing app that I think is unparalleled. The preset filters are amazing and you can create your own and save them to easily use them again. The app is free and comes with some filters, but there is also a VSCO shop where you can purchase more filters. I suggest finding the perfect filter for your style and then using it on all of your Instagram posts - it'll keep your profile nice and consistent.
You can also use VSCO on your desktop - once you know there is a filter that you want to use for your photos, you can install the VSCO presets on Adobe Lightroom for photos that need a little more editing than you can do on your phone.