Publishing and Scheduling Posts
Instagram posts can be published in the following ways on Zoho Social:
- Direct publishing from Zoho Social
- Publishing via Zoho Social (Mobile App) + Instagram App
This is determined by the type of Instagram Profile you own, that is:
- Professional
- Personal
With an Instagram Business Profile, you can access several features like direct publishing, commenting, and hashtag search. If you haven’t converted your Instagram account to a Business Profile yet, managing Instagram posts requires the use of the Zoho Social app and the Instagram app on your phone.
New to Instagram?
Direct Publishing for Instagram Business Profiles
Follow these steps to directly schedule and publish posts to Instagram via Zoho Social:
- Switch to an Instagram Business Profile
- Connect your Instagram account with Zoho Social
- Authenticate your Business Profile with an associated Page on Facebook.
1. Switch to an Instagram Business Profile
Follow these steps to
make the switch to Instagram Business:
- Go to your Instagram mobile app and head over to profile Settings.
- Under Accounts, tap Switch to Business Profile.
- Click Continue till you reach a screen that prompts you to Connect to Facebook.
- In order to switch to a Business Profile on Instagram, Facebook requires you to authenticate your Business Profile with a Facebook Page.
- Once you have signed in to the right Facebook account, select a Facebook Page that you'd like to associate with your Instagram Business Profile.
- Complete the steps by adding a few more details such as your email, phone, address, and profile's category.
- Click Done.
2. Connect your Instagram Profile with Zoho Social. Learn more.
3. Authenticate your Instagram Business Profile with a connected Facebook Page
1) Go to Settings, select Social Channels, and click Set up Business Profile, next to the Instagram icon.
4) Click Authenticate Now.
5) You will be prompted to authenticate your Instagram account by logging into the connected Facebook page.
6) Provide Zoho Social the permission to manage the Instagram account you've connected to Zoho Social by clicking OK.
7) You can now enjoy features like direct publishing, commenting, and running hashtag searches on Zoho Social!
Switching between Creator and Business Profile on Zoho Social
After you switch account on the Instagram app to business but you had connected it to Zoho Social as Creator previously, here is how you can switch to Business on Social:
1. Go to Settings, head to Social Channels:
2. Click on Switch to Business account under Instagram Profile
3. Proceed to switch to Business and start publishing posts directly from the browser.
If you switched your profile from Creator to Business on the mobile app, please to update that on Zoho Social with the steps above to access direct publishing.
How Direct Publishing works for Instagram Business Profiles
Once you have switched to Instagram Business and authenticated your account by associating it with a Facebook Page, you can directly publish and schedule images and videos to your Instagram feed. However, do keep in mind the following points:
1. You can post/schedule only one image
Once you've enabled Direct Publishing for your Instagram Business account, you can directly publish and/or schedule
one image—exactly how you would post to your Facebook Page, Twitter Profile, LinkedIn Page, LinkedIn Profile, and Google My Business, via Zoho Social. Do keep in mind that Instagram Direct Publishing does not support multiple images due to
API limitations.
However, if you want to continue posting multiple images, Zoho Social will seek permission to continue posting natively via the Instagram app.
2. Make sure the image is resized to match the uploading specifications by Instagram
Also, keep in mind that the image must fit the uploading requirements defined by Instagram to enable direct publishing. To help you out with this, we provide a crop screen that resizes your image to fit the aspect ratio and dimensions allowed by Instagram for uploading images.
Here's a handy guide in case you want to check whether your image specifications match with each network’s upload criteria.
Size
|
Dimensions
|
Aspect Ratio
|
Supported formats
|
8 MB
|
Landscape: 1080x566 pixels
Potrait:
1080x1350 pixels
Square:
1080x1080 pixels
|
Landscape - 1:91:1
Portrait - 4:5
Square - 1:1
|
.jpeg
|
If you upload multiple images and/or don't resize the image according to the guidelines stated by Instagram, Zoho Social will publish your post via the Instagram app.
Notes for uploading an image
1. Multiple images & animated GIFs - These formats are currently not supported via the direct publishing feature.
3. Aspect ratio - The aspect ratio of an image you'd like to directly publish or schedule must be within the range of 4:5 (for Portrait) and 1.91:1 (for Landscape). The ideal aspect ratio we recommend for Instagram upload is 1: 1 (square image).
Here's how you can directly schedule and publish Instagram Posts:
Before you get started, make sure you have the Zoho Social app and the Instagram app installed on your iOS or Android device.
Also, check you've turned on Notifications from Zoho Social on your device to allow us to send you Instagram Publishing Notifications on the date and time for which you've scheduled your post.
4) You may have to resize your image to be able to post your image directly via Zoho Social. With Zoho Social's resizing tool, you'll have a wide range of editing options such as filters, image resizing, and cropping tools. We also provide a crop screen specific to the Instagram allowed dimension for uploading images.
Here's a small guide to re-check whether your image specifications match with Instagram’s uploading criteria.
Other specifications for Instagram
- Maximum number of characters allowed for captions: 2,200 characters.
- Hashtags: To include hashtags in your post add the # symbol followed by the tag. However, matching suggestions will not appear. You can include 30 hashtags.
- Mentions: You can tag Instagram Profiles in your post. However, matching suggestions will not appear when you use the @ symbol followed by the username. So, make sure you use the correct username while mentioning an Instagram profile
4) Once you're done crafting your post, click Next on the compose screen.
5) The screen will display options like: Publish Now, Custom Schedule, SmartQ, CustomQ, and Save as Draft.