Take a look at our quick video tutorial on how to connect your Instagram account to Loomly:
In this article, we'll cover:
1. How to connect your Instagram account
You can connect your Instagram account from the Social Accounts tab of the Calendar Settings:
The next steps will depend on the settings of your Instagram account. We currently support the following Instagram accounts types:
Connecting through an associated Facebook Page for Instagram Professional Accounts (Business & Creator)
Click on the Connect button
Select the Facebook page connected to the Instagram account from the dropdown > Click Create Connection
Connecting by username for Instagram Personal or Professional Accounts (Business & Creator) without a Facebook page
Click the link "click here instead" in the popup
Type in the Instagram Username > Click Connect Account
⚠️ Note:
Connecting your account with a username will limit the features available.
We recommend converting your personal account to a Business or Creator account and connecting it through an associated Facebook page, so you can take advantage of more automated features!
2. Instagram supported media types and size limits
|
| Size |
.jpg, .jpeg, .gif | 8MB | |
.mp4, .mov | 100MB | |
.mp4, .mov | 100MB
Between 5s and 90s
Aspect ratio of 9:16 |
📝 Note:
You can view the dimensions and sizes of each piece of media you've uploaded in the Library.
You can crop your images to fit Instagram’s size requirements with our Loomly Studio.
Instagram has placed media restrictions on the types of posts that can be automatically published. Here are the instances when you will need to manually publish your posts, stories, and Reels using our reminders feature:
You will need to manually publish to Instagram accounts that have been connected through a username.
Any story-type post for a Creator account.
You will need to use reminders to publish your images and videos that don't meet Instagram's requirements for the feed and story posts that can be automatically published.
Image requirements for automatic publishing
Format: JPEG, PNG, GIF
File size: 8 MB maximum.
Aspect ratio: Must be within a 4:5 to 1.91:1 range
Minimum width: 320 (will be scaled up to the minimum if necessary)
Maximum width: 1440 (will be scaled down to the maximum if necessary)
Height: Varies, depending on width and aspect ratio
Color Space: sRGB. Images using other color spaces will have their color spaces converted to sRGB.
Video/Reels requirements for automatic publishing
Container: MOV or MP4 (MPEG-4 Part 14), no edit lists, moov atom at the front of the file.
Audio codec: AAC, 48khz sample rate maximum, 1 or 2 channels (mono or stereo).
Video codec: HEVC or H264, progressive scan, closed GOP, 4:2:0 chroma subsampling.
Frame rate: 23-60 FPS.
Picture size:
Maximum columns (horizontal pixels): 1920
Videos
Minimum aspect ratio [cols / rows]: 4 / 5
Maximum aspect ratio [cols / rows]: 16 / 9
Reels
Required aspect ratio is between 0.01:1 and 10:1
We recommend 9:16 to avoid cropping or blank spaces.
Video bitrate: VBR, 5Mbps maximum
Audio bitrate: 128kbps
Duration:
Videos: 60 seconds maximum, 3 seconds minimum
Reels: 15 mins maximum, 3 seconds minimum
File size: 100MB maximum
3. Instagram features
A. Instagram post types
You are able to schedule and auto-post the following to Instagram:
Posts to the Feed
Single image or video posts
Carousel posts with multiple photos and/or videos: please note that you can add additional videos to your Instagram post in the Fine-Tuning step
Reels: single-video
Single image or video
You can also manually publish with the help of our reminders in case you want more native customization options like adding stickers to Instagram stories.
B. Instagram publishing features
Here are other features we have available for Instagram:
Tag & @mention users
Invite Collaborators: You boost engagement and create Instagram Collab posts from Loomly!
Select a video cover
Schedule a first comment along with your Instagram post
Tag a location: Start typing in a location into the Location field, and Loomly will populate results that you can choose from
📝 Note:
With Instagram direct publishing, restrictions are put into place by Instagram when you list a location tag. It is only possible to include the location that is associated with a Facebook Page. It can be your Page or any other Facebook Page that has a location.
You can include a maximum of 30 hashtags in both the caption and first comment field combined.
C. Instagram interactions
From our Interactions Management area, you can respond to comments and mentions for Business and Creator accounts. You are also able to respond to direct messages for Business accounts and Creator accounts with less than 500k followers.
This feature is available from the toolbar of each calendar:
Learn more about it here.
D. Instagram analytics
The Analytics dashboard offers insight into your posts' performance. To access Analytics, click on the calendar and go to the Analytics icon:
Loomly Analytics will be your best ally in this quest, empowering you to:
Get a report of Loom.ly URL click counts, sources, & locations.
Dive into account-level statistics.
Get into details with Post Metrics, which includes all the analytics you need to evaluate your posts.
Filter and compare performance by date ranges to evaluate growth and get a better understanding of your success.
Last but not least, export all your analytics as a PDF or CSV file and share them offline with your team!
Here are the metrics available for your Instagram pages:
Account level statistics
New followers: The number of new people who have followed your account. Note: this metric only takes into account people who started following you and does not take into account people who stopped following you.
Total followers: The total number of people who follow your account. The metric, as well as the comparison metrics, includes both people who started following you (New Followers) and people who stopped following you (Unfollows).
Impressions: The number of times your content has been displayed on a screen.
Reach: The total number of unique users who have seen your content.
Please note that the value reported for reach at the account level is the total daily reach values across all accounts. Due to the fact that Instagram reports them with uniqueness across longer time frames, it may not be consistent when comparing between time frames longer than one day.Engagements: The total number of unique Instagram accounts that liked, commented on, or saved a post.
Engagement rate: The number of people a post reached and then liked, shared, commented, or saved a post.
📝 Note:
Instagram Insights reports may slightly differ as they allow reports to be pulled by last day, last 7 days, or last 28 days.
Videos over 60 seconds (previously called IGTV) are supported.
Story analytics
Exits: The number of times someone exited a story.
Impressions: The number of times a story was displayed.
Reach: The number of unique accounts that viewed the story.
Replies: The total number of replies to a story.
Please note that story replies received and left within Japan and Europe will result in a 0 value due to privacy rules as mentioned here.
Taps forward: The total number of taps to see the next story.
Taps back: The total number of taps to see the previous story.
📝 Note:
Story analytics are available for Business and Creator accounts that are connected through a Facebook page.
We recommend waiting until the next day to see stories published from the day prior.
There must be at least 5 unique viewers for us to display metrics for stories.
Shared stories will not be displayed due to API limitations.
Story image previews will expire after a few days.
Story metrics cannot be backfilled.
E. Grid Preview
You can access this from the Post View and Post Builder for unpublished feed posts on all your Instagram Professional accounts connected through a Facebook page. This feature allows you to preview your Instagram feed posts in a grid format:
By default, the post you are previewing will appear at the top left of your grid as the last published post on your Instagram account.
By checking the Show future Loomly posts option, you can also preview what your grid will look like with your upcoming scheduled posts:
