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Have you started using carousels in your Instagram strategy? Instagram Carousels are one of the single greatest ways to increase your engagement on Instagram. These types of posts are shared and saved more often because they stop the scroll and add value. The more shares and saves, the more Instagram rewards your post by showing it to more people who may be interested. We want ALL of those saves and shares.
But first, what is an Instagram Carousel? I'm glad you asked.
Carousels are the “multiple image post” option for Instagram. This feature allows users to post up to 10 photos or videos that their audience can swipe through. Some users are starting to see exponential growth by creating valuable content shared through Carousels.
So, let’s talk about how to design an Instagram Carousel.
Decide how many slides you want in your Carousel
Instagram allows Image Posts to be Landscape, Portrait, or Square. For Carousel Posts, you’ll want to choose Portrait (1080x1350) or Square (1080x1080). If you decide to go with Portrait, just be sure everything in your post fits within the square Instagram Grid on your profile (we don’t want any text getting cut off!).
For this walkthrough, I’ll be using Square. I know that I want 5 slides. Time to do some math. No worries, it’s elementary math. Take the Instagram width dimensions and multiply it by how many slides you’ll be creating. In this case, we will multiply 1080 times 5. That tells us how wide our image needs to be = 5400px.
Start Designing
Open Canva and create a new canvas with these dimensions: 5400x1080.
Next you are going to want to use your ruler and grid tool, to make a mark every 1080px. So a line at 1080px, 2160px, 3240px, and 4320px.
Now that you have your squares in place, you can start creating.
One of my favorite tricks for a Carousel Post is to find ways to place images on “the fold” (the edge of the slide). This way, when the user scrolls there’s a nice effect as the image spills over from one image to the next.
Saving your Carousel Post
Now that you've designed an amazing carousel, it is time to post to Instagram. I use the app unsqrd.
Using the Canva app, save the carousel to your phone. Then upload the image to unsqrd. From there you will have the option to break it up in squares.
From there you will save to your camera roll. Now you are ready to share it to Instagram.
UPDATE
Canva has recently launched a new page which is a resource for creating and designing Instagram posts and stories. Canva's Instagram: https://www.canva.com/instagram/
Have you tried creating a Carousel Post? Let us know in the comments.