YOUR FABULOUS FEED FOR THE SUMMER

Laurie Graham Creative Director | VP of Operations

Summer is here and I am so excited about it. August has always been a favorite month for me, specifically starting about 10 years ago when I was stuck in an unhealthy job environment that was very verbally abusive. I looked for about a year for a new job and could not find one. Then one day I was driving by this cute craftsman's house turned into an office, in the middle of downtown Monrovia, CA, on my way to the job I hated and said out loud, “Why can I not work at a cute place like that?” . Fast forward to a few weeks later, I got an interview at that exact place, and even better, I was hired and my start date was 08/08/2008!! I knew with the numeric repetition in the date there had to be a meaning behind it. I am not into numerology, but it did cause me to do some research and what I found was interesting. If you simply google (which I did), you can find the meaning of the number 8 as below:

“The meaning of the number 8 is harmony, peace, and balance. It is a symbol that helps you make decisions that are beneficial to you in your life.

For people of faith if you research the Number 8 in the Bible, it represents a new beginning, it is a number of hope, new horizons, and a bright future.

Both of those things applied to my life and now August is one of my favorite months of the year and probably why I feel so alive in this month. Usually, these types of feelings happen for people in the springtime, when everything is in bloom, but this spring I was down with Covid, and then a pretty bad kidney infection directly followed, which caused me to miss the whole spring fever thing. Now I am alive, well, and ready to live out my best life, and guess what? I want that for you and your company as well.

Oprah Whinfrey

This summer, at least for me, is all about rebooting. Rebooting my mind, my health, and my passions - and a big part of that is rebooting all things BRANDING & SOCIAL MEDIA. After the interesting year, we all had, a lot of our social media feeds changed drastically. The “pretty” faded away and we struggled to just keep something...anything on our pages. Well, I am here to tell you that it is time to bring the “pretty” back, (Que: Justin Timberlake's song, “I’m bringing sexy back”). Let's infuse our Instagram Feed with inspiring imagery, graphics, and fresh content! It is time to come ALIVE!

Here are 8 ways you can take your IG Feed from “drab to fab” and gain more followers along the way!

1. Consistency is key! – Let’s get rid of all the random posts on your Instagram feed. No more sweatpants photos mixed in with your latest luxury Stage. You do not have to go back and delete unless you have an endless amount of time. Start Planning your feed (what you post on IG ) to look and feel consistent. Here are a few ways you can do that:

On all before and after photos, put the pretty first then in your caption write something like, “swipe to see what a difference Staging makes” . Angles: Angle refers to the degree to which the camera points towards the area you are shooting. You first want to make sure you are using a tripod (even if you have to use your phone to shoot) and make sure the camera is level, second you want to shoot about 5 ft from the ground in the landscape mode, instead of portrait. Lighting: It is always best to use a professional photographer, however, if you are not able to use one, make sure you download the PhotoShop app on your phone so you can lighten and sharpen your photos to all look similar.

** Sidenote: most influencers and brands use some type of custom filter for all their posts to keep their look/brand consistent. I would not recommend this with Staging because you are representing the Home / Real Estate and you do not want to misrepresent the property or your clients’ listing.

2. Use a grid App: A great way to clean up your Instagram feed and curate the most fabulous summer feed would be by using one of the many grid apps you can download to your phone. Here are 3 for you to check out:

The Preview App

Grids 9square for Instagram

3. Choose a style/theme and stick to it. Nothing is worse than seeing a beautifully curated feed interrupted by a random out of place post and I am totally guilty of this. I used to curate my, Jana, and Model My Homes Instagram so precisely and then… let’s just be honest… I got lazy! Tell me which example below is more pleasing to the eye.

THEN VS NOW Our team has started implementing a strategic plan to rebrand and update Jana's feed so properly showcase her as the FEARLESS FOUNDER, TRAILBLAZER & INDUSTRY EXPERT THAT SHE IS. THEN vs NOW Model My Home has already started implementing a new feed plan to tighten up the look and feel of their social feed and have begun to see a difference in their engagement

You also do not have to break up your feed with quotes like the examples above. You can also curate your feed to have images only of your work, just keep them consistent like these:

5. Keep your feed professional, when it comes to bringing PRETTY aka sexy back (yup still singing that song in my head while I write this article). Remember when you are doing reels or IG Stories there is an option to post to your feed. This will break up your consistency and grid. It would be ok to do it for 24hrs but go back the next day and delete it. The only reason you would allow it to be put on your feed is so that you can share it to your IG Stories and then to a highlight reel but we want to make sure we stay focused on the perfectly curated feed.

6. Double-check your back! As in the background of the images that you are going to post. Especially in the homes. This point could very easily lead into a whole photography post, however, as a Stager there is nothing worse than realizing after the fact that a pillow is in the wrong place, or not chopped, or maybe the bed skirt is caught on the frame. Many of you have an assistant or coordinator go out to take images of your Stages for you; make sure they are paying attention to every little detail. Scheduling them to go out immediately after the Stage is the best bet, and that goes for your professional photographers as well. No one should be entering the house between the Stagers and Photographers. 4. Choose your branding colors and use them to balance out your feed

Most likely your company has items and colors you repeat in each house. If your pop of color (pillows, art & accessories) is peach, blue and yellow make sure when you are creating your grid that you are not posting two images next to each other that both have yellow pops of color in them. Make sure your color and themes are not off balance.