[0:00] Thanks to HubSpot for
[0:01] sponsoring today's video.
[0:02] Okay, so I know you think being
[0:03] consistent on Instagram is
[0:05] impossible, but I promise you,
[0:06] you can do it. You just need the right
[0:08] routine. And today I
[0:10] thought I would show you mine.
[0:12] For the past several weeks, I've been in
[0:13] the routine of posting
[0:14] about four times per week
[0:16] on Instagram. I know that might not sound
[0:18] like a lot compared to the
[0:19] 15 posts per day that you
[0:20] hear from some gurus on YouTube, but
[0:21] these are four pieces of
[0:23] intentional and strategic content
[0:25] that align with my brand and my current
[0:28] goals. And in fact, the way
[0:29] I've been posting lately has
[0:30] allowed me to get out of a bit of a
[0:31] growth threat and finally hit 200,000
[0:34] followers over on Instagram.
[0:35] But I think most importantly, this
[0:37] posting schedule has
[0:38] also allowed me to maintain
[0:40] some work-life balance. And in fact, I
[0:42] kind of have a bit of a
[0:43] weird schedule for the past
[0:44] three months. I've been road tripping
[0:46] through Scotland in my
[0:47] camper van. So I usually spend
[0:49] about 50% of my time exploring and 50% of
[0:52] my time working on my laptop. I'm
[0:54] actually currently in an
[0:55] Airbnb in London though, because I am
[0:57] going to be heading home to Canada in
[0:58] just a few short days.
[1:00] But I wanted to show you the content
[1:01] planning routine that I've
[1:02] been using on a weekly basis
[1:03] throughout my travels to stay consistent
[1:05] and grow on Instagram while
[1:06] still also having a life. So
[1:08] today is actually going to be part one of
[1:10] my series where I'm going to take you
[1:11] behind the scenes of
[1:12] my Instagram content creation workflow.
[1:15] And we're focusing
[1:15] specifically on planning content,
[1:18] how I consistently come up with ideas to
[1:21] stay consistent and to
[1:22] actually grow. So I'm going
[1:23] to take you along with me and hopefully
[1:25] we'll have some Instagram
[1:27] content planned by the end of it.
[1:28] So let's get started. Okay, so the very
[1:30] first step in this
[1:31] process is to select the formats
[1:34] that we're going to use for our content
[1:36] this week. I have personally
[1:37] found that the best way to do
[1:38] this is by using a format menu. Just like
[1:41] options of food at a
[1:42] restaurant, this is a list of options
[1:43] of different formats of short form
[1:45] content that you can create. It's
[1:47] basically the packaging that
[1:48] the content is going to go into. And
[1:50] we'll worry about like the
[1:51] subject matter of that content in
[1:52] just a few minutes. So here's a look at
[1:54] my format menu. We've got
[1:56] voiceover vlog, a chat to camera
[1:58] video, a tutorial or a trend. These are
[2:00] just four formats that I
[2:02] have found work pretty well with
[2:03] my audience. You could definitely have
[2:05] some other options on your format menu
[2:07] like get ready with me
[2:08] or green screen videos or different types
[2:11] of carousels. I find it's
[2:12] helpful to have a format
[2:13] menu like this because it provides
[2:15] creative constraints. It
[2:17] might seem counterintuitive,
[2:18] but it's actually really, really helpful
[2:19] to your creativity to have some
[2:21] boundaries around what
[2:22] you're going to create. If you just tell
[2:23] yourself to come up with
[2:24] Instagram ideas, that is so broad
[2:26] and open ended. It's really hard to even
[2:28] start. But if you tell
[2:29] yourself, okay, I need to come up
[2:30] with a voiceover vlog, it gets you
[2:32] started down a path, which is just way
[2:34] easier than, you know,
[2:34] starting from a blank page. So for this
[2:36] coming week, I think we'll do two trend
[2:39] videos. I definitely
[2:40] want to do one voiceover vlog and one
[2:43] carousel as well. So as for the strategy
[2:45] of how I'm selecting
[2:46] these formats, one consideration is just
[2:48] variety. I haven't done a
[2:49] voiceover vlog in a while, so I
[2:51] want to do one again. Another
[2:52] consideration is ideas that I already
[2:54] have floating around, which
[2:55] we're going to talk about in just a
[2:56] second. But I have a couple things in the
[2:58] back of my mind that
[2:59] I think would work well as trend or like
[3:01] text on B roll format videos.
[3:03] So I want to make sure I add
[3:04] those to my calendar so I can make use of
[3:05] those ideas. KV from the
[3:07] future here to interrupt myself
[3:09] very briefly. So I want to let you know
[3:11] that if you want to schedule
[3:12] your content in a structured
[3:14] format similar to how I do, then you
[3:16] should check out HubSpot's
[3:18] free social media content
[3:19] calendar template. It's a completely free
[3:22] resource that helps you
[3:23] plan your content strategically
[3:24] month by month. It basically covers every
[3:26] platform Instagram
[3:28] YouTube TikTok Snapchat
[3:30] Facebook, LinkedIn. So no matter which or
[3:32] how many of those you use,
[3:33] it's got you covered. All you
[3:34] need to do to get started is add it to
[3:36] your Google Drive or
[3:36] download it as a spreadsheet if you
[3:38] prefer. Then you can pick the platform
[3:39] and content type, write the
[3:41] caption, and if it's sponsored,
[3:42] you can track those details as well. The
[3:44] template even helps you track your
[3:46] engagement rate over
[3:47] time, which is super helpful when it
[3:48] comes to pitching for
[3:49] those brand deals. My personal
[3:51] favorite part is this calendar view
[3:53] because it helps you keep track of all
[3:54] your planned content
[3:55] across formats. As I mentioned, this free
[3:57] guide was developed by
[3:58] HubSpot who sponsored today's
[3:59] video. You can get it for yourself for
[4:01] free using the link in my description.
[4:03] The second step is to
[4:05] choose a goal or a focus for the week.
[4:07] Now, admittedly, you could
[4:08] definitely do this first.
[4:09] In fact, a lot of the steps in this
[4:10] process, you could kind of scramble them
[4:12] around and do them in
[4:12] different orders. I find it helpful to
[4:14] start with picking the
[4:15] formats because it provides
[4:17] those creative constraints. With those
[4:18] formats or that packaging in mind, now
[4:21] we're going to come up
[4:21] with what our goal is, the cohesive theme
[4:24] or the purpose behind the
[4:25] content that we're making. Some
[4:27] examples might be promoting your
[4:28] affiliate links, growing your email list,
[4:31] selling your digital
[4:32] products, getting people to watch your
[4:33] YouTube videos or listen to
[4:34] your podcast. There's lots
[4:36] of different results that you can get if
[4:37] you craft your Instagram content
[4:39] strategically. So just
[4:40] consider what you might want that to be.
[4:42] Other than that, you might
[4:42] just be aiming for audience
[4:44] growth and that's totally valid too. So I
[4:47] think for myself, I want
[4:48] my content for this week to
[4:50] generate new email list subscribers.
[4:53] Honestly, I know this is
[4:54] something that I can neglect and I
[4:55] have been neglecting for a long time, but
[4:57] it's actually like so
[4:58] easy to connect it into a lot
[5:00] of content, you know, basically telling
[5:01] people about like my free
[5:03] offers that will get them onto
[5:04] my email list or even like promoting my
[5:06] weekly creator letter to
[5:08] send it every Monday. So this
[5:09] is going to be my personal guiding
[5:10] principle for the content that I'm going
[5:12] to plan today. Remember,
[5:13] just because you're setting an overall
[5:15] goal for your content
[5:16] doesn't mean that everything needs
[5:17] to feel like it's out of a marketing
[5:18] campaign. The goal tie-in can be as
[5:20] simple as making the
[5:22] caption of your real a call to action to
[5:24] joining your email list. I
[5:26] personally think it's really
[5:27] important that we don't let strategy take
[5:29] out all the fun of content
[5:31] creation, partially because
[5:32] that's why most of us got started in the
[5:33] first place, but also
[5:34] because I think that's really
[5:35] where the magic and authenticity comes
[5:37] into play and what makes
[5:38] people actually like consuming your
[5:40] content. So it's always a fine balance,
[5:42] right? Having some strategy and
[5:43] overarching purpose to
[5:44] what you're making so that you can work
[5:46] towards your business
[5:47] goals, while at the same time,
[5:48] leaving things open ended enough that you
[5:49] can really let your
[5:50] creativity shine. So yeah,
[5:52] don't let the goal setting like take
[5:53] over, but just something good
[5:54] to keep in mind. The next step
[5:56] is to reference our existing list of
[5:59] ideas, which admittedly is a
[6:02] bit of a cheat code. I know,
[6:03] but this is part of my regular practice
[6:05] as a content creator. I
[6:06] just keep an active note in
[6:08] my notes app on my phone where I add
[6:10] ideas as I come across stuff when I'm
[6:12] scrolling or something
[6:14] just pops into my mind or shower thoughts
[6:15] or whatever. Okay, but I
[6:16] get that just like telling
[6:17] you to look at your previous list of
[6:19] ideas is not super helpful.
[6:21] So while I am going to do that,
[6:22] I did want to share some tips with you in
[6:24] case you're starting from
[6:25] scratch and you need some
[6:26] guidance for coming up with your first
[6:28] ideas. Okay, so here are a
[6:30] few things you can do. One thing
[6:32] is set yourself some limited scroll time,
[6:35] set a timer for like 15 or
[6:37] 20 minutes and scroll through
[6:39] your Instagram reels feed or even your
[6:41] TikTok for you page
[6:42] intentionally looking for content
[6:44] inspiration. You might want to keep an
[6:45] eye out for audios that
[6:46] you're seeing again and again,
[6:48] or formats that seem to be going viral
[6:50] right now. Like if everybody's
[6:51] using the same structure of a
[6:52] meme, maybe you could find a way to use
[6:54] that too. Second thing you
[6:56] can do is to scroll through your
[6:57] recent comments or DMs keeping an eye out
[6:59] for frequently asked
[7:00] questions or common themes that
[7:03] just pop up again and again. That's a
[7:04] good indication of
[7:05] content that your audience would
[7:06] be interested in seeing. And the third
[7:08] thing that I would recommend you do is
[7:09] look back through your
[7:10] past content and see what has performed
[7:13] the best for you. Now,
[7:14] depending on that goal that we were
[7:16] just talking about what the best is might
[7:18] change. If your main goal
[7:19] is audience growth and reach,
[7:21] then of course, you can look and see what
[7:23] reels got the most views.
[7:24] However, remember that a lot
[7:25] of reach doesn't necessarily equal
[7:27] audience growth. So if you're
[7:28] specifically looking to gain
[7:30] followers, what you might want to do is
[7:31] go into your Instagram
[7:32] insights, go to the professional
[7:33] dashboard, tap into content you shared,
[7:36] let's maybe look at like
[7:37] the last three months to get
[7:38] a broader sense of it. Then you can
[7:40] change your filter for the
[7:42] metric to be follows instead of
[7:44] views. I recommend leaving as sort by
[7:46] highest and then tap apply. Now we can
[7:48] actually see the content
[7:49] that generated the most followers for me,
[7:52] not just the most views.
[7:53] So I'm going to take a look
[7:53] at this content and think why do I think
[7:55] that it generated more
[7:56] followers for me and how can I use
[7:58] that same strategy in the content that
[7:59] I'm coming up with for this
[8:00] new week. So in this next step,
[8:02] we get to play matchup. We're going to
[8:04] connect the ideas that we came
[8:05] up with to the formats that we
[8:07] chose earlier. Now I'll be honest with
[8:08] you. Normally I would
[8:09] just do this in my head or on
[8:11] my computer, but I wanted to make this
[8:12] really clear because I honestly feel like
[8:14] if you can understand
[8:15] how to strategically mix and match the
[8:18] ideas that you have for content with the
[8:20] way that you package
[8:22] those ideas, I think that's like a
[8:24] superpower for content creators.
[8:26] Oftentimes we have one idea,
[8:27] we share it in one way and then we kind
[8:30] of just let it go and try
[8:31] to move on to coming up with
[8:32] something new. There's actually so much
[8:33] potential in each idea to
[8:34] package it in multiple different
[8:36] ways. So let me give you a real life
[8:37] example of this. After I
[8:38] made a video about how to write
[8:40] better voiceovers and that performs so
[8:42] well for me, I wanted to do
[8:43] more content about voiceover
[8:45] tips. So I had the idea to share five
[8:47] different voiceover prompts
[8:48] to give you a starting point
[8:50] for like writing your voiceover and I
[8:52] ended up making two pieces of
[8:53] content out of the same idea.
[8:54] One was a carousel where I put each
[8:56] prompt on a different slide
[8:57] and the other was a trending
[8:58] reel where I had the prompts listed in
[9:01] the captions. So you can
[9:02] see how this is the exact
[9:03] same subject matter. I've just packaged
[9:05] it in two different ways.
[9:06] You'll get way more out of each
[9:08] individual idea if you start approaching
[9:10] it like that. I've written
[9:11] down the ideas that I came up
[9:12] with through scrolling, through just like
[9:14] writing down my shower thoughts
[9:15] throughout the week and
[9:16] what I also have here are the different
[9:19] formats from my format
[9:20] menu. When you realize that you
[9:21] can take one idea and match it up with
[9:24] several different formats and create
[9:26] basically four pieces
[9:27] of content out of one idea, that is such
[9:30] a hack for consistency
[9:32] without so much effort and stress.
[9:35] Especially when it comes to getting inspo
[9:38] from content that we see
[9:39] online. I think the best
[9:41] magic happens when you see something
[9:43] creative that somebody else made and not
[9:45] only do you put your
[9:46] own spin on it, your own unique take, but
[9:48] you also do it in a slightly different
[9:50] format or packaging.
[9:52] So one example I would say for this is I
[9:54] had seen this trend going
[9:55] around on reels that was like,
[9:56] "I'm not scared of aging because this is
[9:58] what my mom looks like at
[9:59] 50." And the trend in this case
[10:01] was a video of basically showing off how
[10:03] young and hot your mom
[10:04] still looks, how like she still
[10:06] looks like she's 25. That was the
[10:07] inspiration for this post that I made
[10:10] that first of all I did as
[10:11] a carousel rather than a reel. So I
[10:13] changed the format or the
[10:14] packaging, but I also had my own
[10:16] fresh take on it, which was, "Guys, why
[10:18] do we care so much about whether or not
[10:20] our mom has wrinkles
[10:21] or gray hair? There's so much more to
[10:23] life than our appearance."
[10:25] And so that's what I was trying
[10:25] to highlight with that carousel. So
[10:28] that's where I took the inspiration. Not
[10:30] only did I put my own
[10:31] perspective on it, but I also put it in
[10:33] new packaging. Okay, so
[10:34] let's do that with the ideas
[10:35] that I came up with this week. Okay,
[10:37] starting with the best phone tripod.
[10:40] Basically, I got this
[10:41] new mount for my tripod, which is like a
[10:43] MagSafe adapter. I was raving to Dan
[10:46] about how much I love
[10:46] this thing and he was like, "You should
[10:48] make real about that." So for
[10:49] example, I could do this one
[10:50] as a tutorial, right? I could kind of
[10:52] demonstrate setting it up, all the
[10:54] different features that it
[10:55] has. And I may do that at some future
[10:57] point, but I think for this
[10:58] week, I would like to do it as a
[10:59] trend kind of video. Basically what I
[11:01] mean by that is just showing
[11:02] B-roll of me like setting up the
[11:04] tripod, my phone, maginating to the
[11:06] mount, probably with some text on screen
[11:08] that's something like
[11:08] POV, "You found the best tripod for
[11:11] creators," or I'll come up
[11:12] with something better than that,
[11:13] but that's the concept. Another one that
[11:15] I think is going to go in
[11:16] the trend category here,
[11:18] I wanted to talk about the fact that
[11:19] unfortunately, consistency does work for
[11:23] content creators. I was
[11:24] inspired by this reel, though I know many
[11:25] take this format,
[11:27] basically saying, "Yeah, you know
[11:29] that thing that we all know that we kind
[11:30] of need to do? That's
[11:31] annoying, but yeah, unfortunately,
[11:33] it does really work." Next up, I thought
[11:35] I would talk about whether
[11:37] or not van life is worth it. I
[11:39] feel like a lot of people have a lot of
[11:40] opinions about traveling,
[11:42] doing van life, is it really as
[11:44] glamorous as it seems. And recently I was
[11:46] talking to some van life
[11:47] friends of mine, and we were
[11:48] discussing how van life is really a trade
[11:50] off between like comfort
[11:51] and freedom. And I thought
[11:52] that was a really interesting concept. So
[11:54] I kind of wanted to talk
[11:55] about that in a reel. I could do
[11:56] this as a little chat to camera where
[11:59] I'm, you know, just discussing this
[12:00] stuff, FaceTime style,
[12:01] but I think it would be much more
[12:03] effective as a voiceover vlog.
[12:05] I have so much B-roll from my
[12:08] time traveling in the van, and I want to
[12:10] make use of it. So I'm going
[12:11] to write a voiceover script,
[12:12] and then basically put it over all of the
[12:14] cutesy B-roll that I captured. And
[12:16] finally, we have this
[12:18] concept, which is, I really think we need
[12:20] to rebrand trying and make
[12:22] trying cool, because a lot of
[12:23] people see trying as being cringy. Like
[12:25] basically, if you're doing
[12:26] something, but you're not good at
[12:27] it yet, it's like cringe. I think it's
[12:29] very cool. I think it's very
[12:30] admirable. I think this is very
[12:32] relevant to my audience of content
[12:34] creators. So I could do this as a little
[12:36] voiceover vlog, you know,
[12:37] a script over top of clips of me doing
[12:40] creator stuff. I could do
[12:42] this as a chat to camera,
[12:43] or even maybe I'm like getting ready and
[12:44] doing my makeup or making a
[12:45] coffee and talking about this.
[12:47] I think what I actually want to do, and I
[12:48] don't have this format here
[12:50] right now, but I think I'm
[12:51] going to do it as a carousel. Carousels
[12:53] have been performing really well for me
[12:55] lately. Like they're
[12:56] actually getting more views than my reels
[12:58] have been, which is kind
[12:59] of crazy. And I kind of want
[13:00] to try out this format of carousel where
[13:02] you have like a little
[13:03] screenshot of like basically text
[13:05] bubbles over top of pictures. So yeah,
[13:08] hopefully you're able to see
[13:09] how any of these ideas could
[13:11] be matched up with these different
[13:13] packages. I'm just choosing to take this
[13:15] approach because, you
[13:16] know, I feel like it this week and for
[13:19] the other reasoning I've
[13:20] shared. But if there's one message
[13:21] you take away from this video, I want you
[13:23] to know that you could take
[13:24] this one concept and pair it
[13:26] up with any of these formats. And it just
[13:29] unlocks the door to so much
[13:30] more content that really makes
[13:32] the most of those ideas that you're
[13:34] having rather than just throwing them
[13:35] away off of one format,
[13:37] one time, you can reuse it and reach more
[13:40] people and reach people
[13:41] in different ways because
[13:42] everybody has their format preferences,
[13:44] right? All right, we have
[13:45] reached the final step in the
[13:48] process. I would personally say that the
[13:50] most difficult work is
[13:51] behind us because I feel like
[13:53] we've got some momentum at this stage.
[13:55] I'm going to script and outline this
[13:57] content because basically
[13:59] when I actually go ahead and set up and
[14:01] film, I want to be able to
[14:02] do it in the most efficient
[14:03] way possible. I don't want to be thinking
[14:05] about, well, what should I
[14:06] say? And what was my idea
[14:07] about that? I'm going to write out the
[14:08] scripts for the voiceovers. So then
[14:10] basically I'm ready to go.
[14:12] Okay, so I've got some of my scripts
[14:13] written and this time
[14:14] around I just have like the one
[14:15] voiceover and then the trend one. So it's
[14:18] actually not a ton of writing, but I
[14:19] thought I would show
[14:20] you quickly what I like kind of format
[14:22] these like. This one's quite
[14:24] straightforward. It's literally
[14:25] just the text like the script of the
[14:27] voiceover. And then I'm going to go
[14:28] through my B-roll library
[14:31] and pick out some clips of like van life
[14:33] and travel that I think
[14:35] will work well with what I'm
[14:36] saying. I also wanted to show you a
[14:38] script from a reel I did a few weeks ago
[14:40] to give you a better
[14:41] example when I'm like planning out more
[14:43] of the visuals. Here's a
[14:44] look at a tutorial that I did
[14:45] a few weeks back about how to make your
[14:47] footage less shaky without using a
[14:48] gimbal. This also gives
[14:50] you a good sense of what this looks like
[14:51] filled out in Notion. So
[14:53] you can see like I typed the
[14:54] caption into this form here because it's
[14:56] so easy to just copy it and
[14:58] then put it into my Instagram
[14:59] caption. But yeah, here's what the script
[15:01] looks like. So you see I
[15:02] have the text all down the left
[15:04] hand column and then on the right hand
[15:05] column I have my visuals.
[15:07] They're just descriptions of the
[15:08] clips that I wanted to get that would
[15:10] explain what I'm talking
[15:11] about in the script. So there
[15:13] we go. That is another week of content
[15:15] planned. All that's left to
[15:17] do is film and edit and write
[15:19] the captions. Obviously there is still
[15:21] quite a bit of work left to do, but I am
[15:23] planning to bring you
[15:24] along with me for that. So make sure
[15:26] you're subscribed because
[15:27] next week I'm planning to
[15:28] show you my process for batch filming
[15:30] reels. So you won't want to
[15:32] miss that. I hope you're having
[15:33] adventures and following your dreams and
[15:35] I'll catch you in the next video. Bye!