Collaborative Posts on Instagram

How and why to do them

A collaborative post on Instagram is when one post is shared simultaneously on two pages at the same time. You can spot these by noticing account names of both collaborators at the top of said post. 

Here’s an example of a collaborative post we, at BoldBrush, did with CCS Fine Art Materials:

This feature on Instagram is most useful for paid promotions or to make the best use of content relevant to two related audiences. For example, you might paint portraits and you find a page that shares art similar to yours. 

Here are some practical ideas for collaboration posts:

You might be using a specific type of paint to produce a certain artistic effect, in that case a good collaboration post would be showing the paint and then showing what you made with it.

If a reel features a particular palette, it might perform well when shared between the artist and palette manufacturer. 

And of course, if you make something with another artist, you can post it together with them.

Another use case is when you're doing an art show. You can coordinate with the gallery and post selected photos or videos together so that they reach more people.

The principle is simple: if you have content that is or could be easily connected to another page, making it a collaborative post will increase its reach. You tap into other people's audiences and more people learn about your art. This can have a profound effect on your art business, so don't sleep on this feature and think about how you can use it and who a relevant collab partner might be for you.

Here’s how you make a collab post:

After you upload your photo, you should see a "Tag People" button under your post, during the drafting stage. 

Tap it and you'll see two options: "Add Tag" on the left and "Invite Collaborator" on the right. Right now, you can only invite 1 collaborator per post.

However, you shouldn't just invite people at random. One reason why is that just as immediate engagement (likes, comments, shares) encourages a post to hit the explore page on Instagram, the faster an invite is accepted, the better it is for each post. Because of this, make sure the collaboration is planned and approved in advance so that each post has the maximum reach possible. 

Another important thing to note: after someone's viewed a collab reel, when they swipe away, they'll swipe into the content from the page hosting the collaboration.

Let’s say you and Boldbrush collaborated on a post. If you are the one hosting the post and a visitor on the Boldbrush page swipes up after watching the reel, they'll see your next reel. 

But if the call to action (e. g.: "check out this awesome page for artists") is pointing people to Boldbrush, then it would be more fitting to have Boldbrush host the collab post, not you.

Or let's say that the collaboration is promoting an upcoming show at a gallery. You can host the collab post and then when a user swipes up, they'll see more of your videos. However, if the gallery has high quality videos about the show, then it would make sense for them to host the collab post.

So to sum it up, you can find how to do a collab post by tapping the "Tag People" button. Your collabs should be planned ahead, so that your collab invite gets accepted fast (good for the algorithm). And who's hosting the collab should be dictated by the main call to action: do you want people to swipe into your videos or into the videos of your collaborator?

Cosimo

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