Lessons
Class Introduction
13:31 2Establish your Launch Goal
06:20 3Identify the Logistics
08:55 4Prep your Visuals
05:16 5Research Hashtags
15:29 6Adjust your Bio
05:40 7Document you Starting Stats
07:22 8Tease your Launch
21:32Define the Beginning of your Launch
11:14 10Consider the Algorithm
17:24 11Define Aesthetics for your Feed
33:41 12Brand your Descriptions
07:16 13Share your Content Consistently
03:56 14Optimize your Process
15:35 15Think about Instagram Stories Differently
22:37 16Brainstorm Story Content
11:23 17Create your Stories
11:44 18Leverage Engagement Opportunities
24:27 19Plan a Livestream Schedule
07:03 20Entertain your Live Audience
13:28Lesson Info
Plan a Livestream Schedule
Cleaning your Instagram Live. What's the benefit of doing an Instagram Live? This is all based on the fear of missing out because they go away in 24 hours. This gives you the opportunity to engage live with your audience to do market research, ask questions and share exclusive content. We talked about this earlier. How can you use Instagram Live to support your launch? That's the question and it's really all about including your viewers and creating buzz and excitement about your launch. How can you get them to be part of that conversation? So back to Kim, I was on a Instagram Live, she jumped in and was a part of the conversation. My audience was able to meet Kim from creativelive, and then I had Marcus Murphy come in. So bringing people into the dual broadcast is really an awesome way to get more exposure from their audience or from your audience because once you're in a dual broadcast in Instagram Live, you can invite your viewers into that broadcast. I'm gonna, hi, guys I'm going L...
ive, like now right now so don't tap out of my stories, join me on my Live broadcast. I need to take some screenshots for my presentation onstage at creativelive, and you just might be able to be in them. So that's the reason I went live was to really get some of these screenshots to show you guys the dual broadcast, and to explain that you can absolutely reach another audience when you do that. Here's what you need to consider when you're planning your live stream. What are the dates? We talked about this earlier. Those dates on your content calender. When are you gonna go live, and I suggest doing this weekly, not daily. The content options that your gonna be using varying the times of day that you go live. I use to think that night was best because people are usually chilled, and I found out that doing a live over the weekend like I did this Saturday, I had more views than ever. On the weekend people aren't as hustling and working, so trying it on a weekend might work better, but varying the times to see where you're gonna get the most engagement and who you wanna invite into the broadcast to help promote. So I invited Kim in, so that we could get more sign ups here for social media week, and then I invited one of the speakers and Marcus, you guys heard from yesterday. So get that list together of who you want to be apart of your launch. Now, this is what it looks like for us in a Google doc when we are doing our live scheduling. We have the days of the launch. We have when we're gonna announce the post theme. The Instagram Expert Live Schedule, but what I want you to look at are the purple. When am I going live on my personal account. When am I going live on my business account, and I missed one. I write in the doc that missed it 'cause just didn't have the bandwidth to do it that day, so we wanna know. We wanna look at this as a team. Why did you miss that, we schedule that? You should have done that and we talk about the reasons so that we can improve upon it. So when you document everything you do, and you look at your results you know what's working and what isn't. This is what it looks like for us, and it works really well to keep it in a Google doc. So let's talk about some content ideas when you're doing your Live stream. I love the idea of doing the dual broadcast because this is where if you were talking ahead in your live. I like to be live on Instagram for at least 30 minutes to 40 minutes, and that can get boring hearing the same person talk. And you're usually standing in the same spot. You're not moving like you are on your stories. So bringing in another person, that energy of the other person just helps keep that more exciting and the energy is just higher when a new person comes in. You can also show behind the scenes which I often do when I'm doing my lives. I'll hold up the book, like Michael Hyde's book. I'll show maybe my office. My setup, my mic. Whatever you think is gonna be interesting with the behind the scenes of the product that you're launching, you can show that. You can do a live Q&A, and you can bring people in and out to ask questions that you can answer. You can do audits on people. If you teach social media, you can do an audit and their website. You can do an audit on their LinkedIn account. You can do that publicly and people learn and really see a lot of value around that. You can also teach How Tos in your Instagram Lives. You have an hour to do an Instagram Live and you can do a live event like we're doing here. And then finally you can show your process. And I like to share exclusive ninja tips like I said. Sometimes I get really funny and do props like I said. George loves unicorns and I'm like I have a unicorn pen George, talk to me. He was really excited to be in the conversation. He's a member of the community, and it's so great when other people from the community come in. Notice that there is a title at the bottom that you can pin. If you're looking to understand how to do that, I have a blog post about how to. Everything you need to know about setting up your Instagram Story as well. So let's review those tips for planning your content for a livestream. You wanna make sure that you outline this before you go live. You don't want to try to copy what the other people are doing in their lives. You wanna do what you really holds true to your business and your brand but definitely watch some other broadcast, and see what you like and what you don't like, and get a sense of what think is gonna work for you. And then jot down the core focus of the broadcast. I have those sticky notes. Those Post-It notes with bullets on it, so I stay on topic for about 30 minutes. And then consider the unique value of going live that's gonna offer your followers and maybe it's that exclusive content that we talked about earlier. Sharing only in your Lives. Now before you go Live, there's five tips I want you guys to know. You wanna make sure your lighting is good. You wanna be near a window, natural light, have a diva light on, you wanna be well lit. You're gonna decide whether you're gonna actually hold your phone. Your arms gonna get really tired, so I don't recommend that. I recommend using a mount. You wanna check your WiFi connection. When I did that broadcast outside, it was not the best connection so the replay was a little shaky. It was buffering on the replay, so make sure you have a good WiFi. And you want to also make sure that you shut off your incoming calls, airplane mode because when a call comes in it. It gets turned off. That happened to me before. And this is my favorite, make sure that you have a powered pack on hand because if you're on 4%, and you're in the middle of your broadcast that could definitely be a bummer. So have that battery pack charge with you.
Ratings and Reviews
Cat in the Moon Photo
Can I just say, "I LOVE Sue"! I took her three day course on CreativeLive back in January when I had finally decided that I didn't want to be the only photographer NOT on Instagram. I took that class knowing absolutely NOTHING about the platform and by the end of it, I was up and running. When I heard that she was doing a new class, I knew I had to see it. By the end of the day my head was exploding with information. There are so many new things on IG that I am already WAY behind the times and have so much work to do. Sue delivered the course in true Sue form - highly entertaining and energized. The examples of successful businesses that she uses are so inspirational and make you feel like, "Yes! It IS possible!!" I am sooooo glad I own the course, because there is no way I could get the full benefit from just watching it once. I will be going back to this class MANY times as I develop as an Instagrammer!
a Creativelive Student
I love Sue's energy and her passion for her work is contagious. She is animated and articulate, making learning about Instagram not only fun, but inspiring. I found her tips to be very intuitive and easy to implement if you have the desire and drive to take your Instagram to the next level. I'm at a point where I've grown my Instagram to a respectable amount (13K), but I want to take it to the next level, so I'm doing a one-on-one consultation with her. I really appreciate all the work she's done into creating a program to uplevel your Instagram game.
Nick Davis
Amazing class, super helpful for understanding how to make your Instagram work for your business. And Sue B is engaging and fun to listen to. But make sure you have a pen and paper ready, because there's so much important information you're going to want to write it down! I'm about to start again from the beginning and this time take notes!