Instagram's users flood the app with millions of posts every day. There's always fresh content, but a lot of great stuff gets lost in the shuffle. When you're using Instagram for your business, you can't afford to doomscroll the day away—so you need to use Instagram's collections feature.
Save posts for later, create custom collections, and spend less time trying to find what you need.
Instagram collections: Your Pinterest board to-do list
Instagram's Saves isn't a public feature—the user who posted won't be notified when their post has been saved, nor can a user's saved posts be seen from their profile, so no judgment on what you save. You can organize your saved posts into specific collections (as many as you want) and then come back to those collections for review or inspiration later.
On my personal Instagram, I have a collection for recipes I'd like to make, one for makeup looks to try, and another that's purely for humor. It's like a Pinterest board and a to-do list wrapped into one. For your business, you might have a collection for brand inspiration, another for user-generated content, and another for competitor posts you like. More ideas like that below.
How to save Instagram photos to a collection
To save a post on Instagram, tap the bookmark-shaped button under the bottom-right corner of any post.
On the desktop version of Instagram, a post saved in this way will go into the general collection. On mobile, a small prompt that says Save to Collection will come up on the bottom of the post itself.
Tap this prompt, and you can decide which collection to save the post in.
To see all your saved items, go to your profile and tap the dropdown menu in the top-right corner of the app. Then click Saved.
Every post you've saved is stored in the All Posts collection. You'll also be able to find songs you've saved from Reels, which will be in the Audio collection.
If you've been saving posts without organizing them into collections, you can always do that after the fact. To start a new collection, tap the + sign at the top-right. You'll be asked to name the new collection—do that, tap Next, and then you can select which posts you've previously saved that you want to add to the new collection. Then tap Done.
How to use Instagram collections for your business
Save posts your business has been tagged in
Saving posts your business is tagged in can be, if nothing else, a good confidence booster—you can always go back to this collection if you want to share a win with your team. But it's also super helpful for curating user-generated content (UGC). Here are some tips on how to make the most of UGC on Instagram. A picture of a product in use or a video from a happy customer says more than a dozen glowing reviews.
Save posts from influencers you like
Influencers can be a great resource, but before you pick one, you want to keep an eye on them to see if they align with your brand. One way to do that is to save posts from potential influencers in a collection.
Sure, you could follow the ones you like, but that will quickly balloon and take over your feed. Saving one of their posts instead allows you to keep track of them and review them against other potential candidates. Bonus: you also have an example of their work that you might like to emulate.
Save posts with relevant hashtags
Social media waits for no one, and nowhere is that more evident than in Instagram's trending hashtags. Because they're mercurial by nature, hashtags can be hard to keep track of. Instagram allows you to follow hashtags, but it almost always leads to a spammy feed. I once followed the hashtag #organization, and yikes did I unfollow that quickly.
Saving posts that have a particular hashtag you like can help you keep track of them, no follow necessary. This will give you a gallery of posts that actually exemplify the use of that hashtag. Now, instead of following #organization, I save the organization posts I like in a special Instagram collection called "Konmari Kollection."
Save posts that inspire you
Instagram has a little bit of everything you could ever want (and even what you don't know you want). So you never know when you may come across a post that stops your scrolling with a clever thought or inspiring image. Liking that post signals your acknowledgment to the account that posted it, but it doesn't mean you'll be able to find that post again.
See a post that advertises a business in an interesting way? Save it. See another that gives a good piece of advice? Save it. Motivation? Productivity? Humor? Save, save, and save again. Create an Inspiration collection, and fill it with things that inspire you and will help you build your business.
Why create collections on Instagram?
By saving Instagram posts to collections, you'll have an endless library of content to refer to while keeping your follow list and your feed tidy. Plus, it won't have any effect on your business's public image (feel free to create some "don't do this" types of collections). So figure out what you'd like to come back to, and start creating your collections.
Read more: The best Instagram scheduling apps
