Creating an Aesthetically Appealing Instagram

Ready to make your Instagram stand out from the crowd? Anyone can pick up a camera, take a photo, and post it on Instagram but to truly provide value and build a loyal following is something else entirely. The goal of any Instagram marketing strategy is to entice users to take action - whether it be engaging with your content, following your account, and ultimately purchasing your product. An easy way to do this is by creating an aesthetically appealing Instagram that also tells a story about your brand. Having an Instagram feed that catches the eye and makes you want to take a second look keeps people on your page longer, which increases the likelihood that they will engage with your content, follow, and even become a customer.

Here are six ways to create a visually appealing Instagram:

Overall theme

Before getting started, think about what you want your overall theme for your Instagram page to be. What do you want people to feel? How do you want to be perceived? By keeping questions like this in mind throughout the rest of this article and while taking photos for your Instagram page, you'll be able to accurately get this across to users who stumble upon your profile.

Bonus tip- If you're not able to articulate what exactly it is you like and are more of an "I'll know it when I see it" type of person, then head over to Instagram and start finding a few pages that you like. Then start writing down what it is you like about each of these pages. Is it the color scheme? Or perhaps the way the feed made you feel? Whatever it is you like most, try to see how you can incorporate that into your own Instagram page.

Color scheme

One of the easiest things you can do to create an aesthetically appealing Instagram is to choose a color scheme. You don't even need a ton of knowledge on this subject to pick one out. It can be as simple as selecting a specific color and making that color the focus of all of your photos or choosing a warm/cold color scheme. Warm color schemes include colors like reds, browns, beiges, yellows, and oranges. Cool color schemes include blue, grey, purple, and green. If your brand has more of a warm feeling and you want to evoke this emotion, then a warmer color scheme may be the way to go. However, if you are a travel brand that wants to make people think of the open sky and sea, a more cooling color scheme would be perfect for you. This is a great point to start from, and you can get more specific as time goes on.

Planning your feed layout

Many people just choose photos to post on Instagram without thinking about how this will affect the overall design of the feed. Planning out how your feed will look is the cherry on the cake to an aesthetically appealing Instagram feed and can easily make all of your other work obsolete if this step is skipped. This process includes seeing what your feed will look like before posting new photos and how it will affect the overall "look" of your page. VSCO is a great tool to use that can show you what your feed will look like before posting a photo. This will allow you to plan your feed accordingly and place photos in the optimal position and keep it visually appealing.

Avoid Too Much Self Promotion

There's a reason you're on Instagram. Businesses are there to provide social customer service and to market their product or services. Influencers are there to connect with their audiences and provide value. If all of your posts are about you, you, you, there is a chance that users may get tired of your content and even unfollow you. Focus on how your brand can provide value and make sure that the majority of your posts showcase this.

Filters

If you're going for a visually cohesive profile, then your use of filters is also going to need to be consistent. It can throw off your overall color scheme if you are using warm filters on some photos and cold filters on others. Once you decide on your color scheme, take a look at all of the Instagram filters and note which ones can and cannot be used as part of your color scheme. Make sure to update this list if you decide to change your color scheme.

Take great photos

Regardless of what equipment you are using to take your photos, you need to make sure that they are professional looking and fitting to your overall theme. Your overall layout and color scheme can look great and even make users want to click on some of your images, but your photos also need to be able to hold their own. Make sure to take photos that are in line with your brand, provide value, and get users' attention.

If you need help figuring out what exactly gets people's attention, perform a little test. First, look up one of the hashtags that is popular in your industry. For example, if you run a hotel try looking up the hashtag travel. Of course what will come up are a ton of different travel photos. First, you'll notice the box at the top of the page that says, "Top Posts." Examine these photos to see how they became so popular were able to make it to the top. You can do this for a variety of hashtags, but be sure to keep a list of your findings. You can use these tips the next time you are taking photos and creating content for your Instagram page.‍

Photo credit: @hazelmaven