Did you know that we process images 60,000 times faster than text?! And it’s well known that on Twitter, tweets with photos have higher rates of engagement, more retweets and more clicks.
That’s why I thought you may like to know about an easy way of making the most of your Instagram photos, when they appear on Twitter.
IFTTT ( If This Then That)
IFTTT is a web-based service which allows you to connect apps with ‘recipes’. By choosing one of its recipes, your Instagram photo will actually appear in your tweet, rather than just a link. Here’s how:
- Set up an IFTTT account.
- Activate the ‘Post your Instagrams as native Twitter pics’ recipe.
- Post an image on Instagram.
IFTTT will automatically post your image on Twitter with your caption and it will look something like this:
Under my photo, you can see that my tweet’s been retweeted 4 times and favourited 8 times, showing that by sharing a photo rather than a link, you’re more likely to get more engagement with your Twitter followers.
A couple of things to bear in mind…
- Once you’ve set up this particular IFTTT recipe, you don’t need to also select the Twitter icon on the ‘Share to’ screen in the Instagram app, as everything’s automated.
- You’ll only see the first 140 characters of your Instagram caption with the link on Twitter. So, put the important details at the start of your caption.
I love this IFTTT recipe…it save so much time! And as well as improving the look of my Twitter feed, I’m sure it’s also gone some way to help me grow my Instagram followers.
P.S. Our Social Media for Florists workshop on October 20th is starting to fill up, with 75% of the places already booked.
Thank you so much for this – it’s brilliant!
Can I ask other question? How can you loads images in Hootsuite for Twitter that show as an image and not as a link? Is that possible? Thanks so much. Hazel x
Hi Hazel
You’re welcome. I hope this links helps re your query?
http://www.rebeccacoleman.ca/2015/06/18/marketing-with-twitter/schedule-tweets-with-images-on-hootsuite/
Bets wishes
Rona
Rona hi – thanks for your help – quite by magic the arrows appeared!! Goodness knows where i went wrong but all ok now, many thanks.
Now that my instagram posts are linked directly to Twitter – if I don’t necessary want all posts to be linked, is there a method of preventing individual ones being linked?
Many thanks and best wishes Pam
Hi Pam
That’s great to hear.
As far as I’m aware…all of your Instagram posts will automatically be posted on Twitter.
You’d need to unlink the recipe in IFTTT each time if you didn’t want an individual one to be posted.
Best wishes
Rona
Many thanks Rona for your help – Best wishes Pam
wow that’s nice, I’ve been wondering how to post up an image right via instagram to twitter. IFFT rocks, thanks for the info 🙂
You’re welcome, Kim 🙂