Instagram is a great space to grow your author platform. Something that'll draw viewers and subscribers are using effective hashtags and brand photos. Read more about that here.
Below are post, story, and reel ideas, which can all be interchangeable and shared across the various methods on Instagram.
For posts- the algorithm is favoring a carousel of pictures, so create more in Canva or share more about that topic
Post Ideas:
Look for monthly challenges that allow you to talk about you, your book, and your writing process. Some current & past ones include: #StorySnippetSaturday, #FridayKiss, #TeaserTuesday, etc. There are so many! Find ones you connect with most
Selfies/get to know you posts
Your Book/WIP
Your Routine
Your Outlining Methods or how it's going
Writing Area (desk, motivational wall/desk decor, must haves while writing).
Aesthetic
Characters
Favorite Tropes
Writing Tips
Querying Tips
Pitch Tips
Self-Pub or Trad-Pub tips
Writing Journey
Lessons Learned
Current Read
Book Reviews
Craft Books
Memory/Story about your WIP
Updates/Progress
A look back- how you've grown
Motivational Quotes
Goals, & where you're at with those goals
Snippet from WIP
Character Art/Book Merch (including from books that aren't yours)
Collections- like candles, funko pops, bookmarks, etc
Book Signings- how that went
Writing Conferences- how that went
Shapes with books- fav books, tbr, books that have the same colors or for the season
& MORE
Story Ideas:
Live writing sprints
Live discussions
Day in the Life
Quick tips
Quick lessons learned
Updates
Goals
Ask/Answer questions
Post polls
Shout out other authors/accounts
Share ^ their posts & stories
Talk about your latest blog post
Talk about your latest YouTube video
Answer questions to a Tag or Challenge
Share facts about yourself
Share your favorite things at the moment
Share what you're up to
What are you doing? Take a pic & tag others
Current Reads/reviews
& MORE
Reels:
All of the above plus Quotes from your book
Quotes from your favorite books
Your writing process
A date to the bookstore
Editing your book
Inspirational quotes
& MORE
For reels, make sure they're not too long!
Preview App:
This app allows you to write your content in the caption of your photo for easy upload to Instagram. If you're feeling inspired to create a ton of posts, you can write them all in Preview and then schedule them for the week or month or whatever. It's so handy and helpful!
Take the stress out of building and maintaining your author platform by bulk/batch creating content. See more about that in the post about Creating Brand Photos.
Canva:
You can create reels on Instagram but you can also create them in canva! Which makes creating graphics of quotes and compiling them into a video even easier! When you add it to Instagram, you can then add music, text, and whatever else.