How To Get Started With Apaya

Welcome to Apaya! This guide will walk you through the essential setup steps to start creating and scheduling AI-powered social media posts.

Before You Begin

Before creating your first campaign, you’ll need to complete these foundational setup steps:

Step 1: Connect Your Social Media Accounts

Your social media accounts need to be connected to start publishing content. This is typically completed during onboarding, but if you haven’t connected them yet:

1. Navigate to Connections in the left sidebar
2. Connect your social media accounts to enable publishing
3. Verify each account shows as “Connected” with the correct username

You can connect:

• Instagram
• X (Twitter)
• LinkedIn (Personal and Business)
• Facebook Pages

Step 2: Verify Your Brand Framework

Your Brand Framework is the foundation for AI-generated content that matches your brand voice and messaging. This is automatically created during onboarding using AI analysis of your website.

To review and update your Brand Framework:

1. Go to Framework in the left sidebar
2. Review all sections including:
   • Brand Profile (basic information, website, email, social handles)
   • Brand Framework (vision, industry, tone & personality, niche, USPs, target audience, pain points, CTAs)
3. If you haven’t set this up yet, scroll to the bottom of the page and click “Re-analyze Website”
4. Review the AI-generated content for accuracy
5. Edit any sections that need adjustment to better reflect your brand

Step 3: Configure Your Brand Identity

Your visual brand identity ensures consistent presentation across all social media posts.

1. Navigate to Identity in the left sidebar
2. Verify your logo displays correctly
   • Adjust logo settings if needed (background, padding, corner radius)
3. Review and select your color palettes
   • Important: Make sure your Default Brand Colors palette is selected
   • You can choose from various color schemes (Monochromatic, Complementary, Analogous, Triadic, Split Complementary)

Creating Your First Campaign.

Once you’ve completed these three setup steps, you’re ready to create your first campaign! Campaigns use AI to generate social media posts that you can then schedule and publish across your connected platforms.

Campaigns are the heart of Apaya’s AI-powered social media automation. Here’s how to create your first campaign:

Step 1: Navigate to Campaigns

1. Click Campaigns in the left sidebar
2. Click the “+ New Campaign” button in the top right corner

Step 2: Configure Campaign Settings

The New Campaign wizard will guide you through 4 steps:

Campaign Info

• Campaign Name: Give your campaign a descriptive name

Generate Posts

Choose how you want to generate your posts:

• Apaya AI Generated Posts: Let Apaya’s AI create posts for you automatically
• Provide My Own Content: Create posts manually with your own content

Choose Content Strategy

Select your content approach:

• Choose Content Pillar: Select specific content topics like educational, promotional, or community-building posts
• Topic Based: Select specific topics from your Brand Profile

Choose Content Pillar Options

If you selected Content Pillar, you can customize which types of content to include:

• Educate: Share insights, tips, and knowledge to help and avoid mistakes
• Connect: Build community connections and encourage audience engagement
• Empathize: Show understanding of struggles and make them feel heard
• Simplify: Break down complexity and make topics easy to understand
• Vision: Paint an inspiring picture of what life could look like after solutions
• Overcome: Address objections and limitations people might have
• Compare: Highlight differences between options and competitors
• Showcase: Demonstrate capabilities and features of your products/services

Apaya AI Guidance

Provide additional instructions for the AI to follow when generating posts (optional)

Choose Template Mode

• Auto Template Selection: Apaya automatically chooses the best templates
• Manual Template Selection: You choose the templates to control your posts’ appearance

Choose Accounts

Select which social media accounts will be used for this campaign:

• Instagram
• LinkedIn Business
• X / Twitter
• Facebook

Schedule Posts

Set your posting schedule:

• Start Date: When the campaign should begin
• End Date: When the campaign should end (optional)
• Posts Per Day: Maximum number of posts per day
• Send at specific time of day: Toggle on to set exact posting times

After you choose all your settings, click Next.

Step 3: Choose Templates

After configuring your initial campaign settings, you’ll move to template selection (if you chose Manual Template Selection).

The template selection screen displays a variety of pre-designed templates that you can use to create your posts. These templates maintain your brand consistency while providing visual variety.

Template Selection Interface:

• Templates are displayed in a grid layout
• Each template shows:
  • Preview of the design with your brand colors
  • Placeholder text showing where content will appear
  • Green checkmarks (✓) indicate selected templates
• Templates feature various layouts

How to Select Templates:

1. Click on any template to select/deselect it
2. Selected templates will show a green checkmark
3. Choose multiple templates for variety in your campaign
4. The system will rotate through your selected templates when generating posts

Template Tips:

• Select a bunch of templates for a good variety without overwhelming your audience
• Choose templates that complement each other while maintaining brand consistency
• Mix different styles (dark/light, simple/bold) for visual interest
• Consider how different templates might work better for different types of content

Once you’ve selected your templates, click Next to proceed to the next step of campaign creation.

Step 4: AI Post Generation Process

After selecting your templates (or choosing auto-template selection), clicking Next initiates the AI generation process.

What happens during generation:

The AI works through several stages:

• Analyzing your campaign goals – Understanding your objectives
• Generating concepts – Creating content ideas based on your brand framework
• Writing headlines – Crafting attention-grabbing headlines
• Creating captions – Developing supporting text and body content
• Finalizing your posts – Assembling everything into complete posts

This process typically takes 30-60 seconds, depending on the number of posts being generated.

Step 5: Review Generated Posts

Once generation is complete, you’ll see the Review Generated Posts screen where you can review and refine the AI-created content.

Review Screen Features:

• Posts Counter: Shows total number of posts generated (e.g., “14 Posts Generated”)
• Post Cards: Each generated post is displayed in its own card showing:
  • Post number (Post 1, Post 2, etc.)
  • Template type (e.g., “Headline + Sub-headline”)
  • Content sections:
    • HEADLINE: The main attention-grabbing text
    • SUB-HEADLINE: Supporting text that expands on the headline
    • CAPTION: The full post caption with your message
    • Topic: The content pillar or topic category

Editing Options:

1. Edit Button: Click “Edit” on any post to modify the content

2. Regenerate Individual Posts:

   • Click “Regenerate” below any post
   • You can provide specific instructions for regeneration
   • Example: “make it shorter, add a playful tone, mention our free trial”
   • Leave blank to regenerate with the same parameters

3. Regeneration Dialog:

   • Text field appears when you click “Regenerate”
   • Optional: “Share what you’d like changed”
   • “Leave blank to regenerate as-is”
   • Click Regenerate to apply changes or Cancel to keep current version

Best Practices for Review:

• Read through each post to ensure accuracy and brand alignment
• Check that CTAs (calls-to-action) are appropriate
• Verify any specific claims or statistics
• Ensure variety across posts to maintain audience interest
• Edit posts that need refinement rather than regenerating the entire campaign
• Use the regenerate feature when you want AI to completely rewrite a post

Step 6: Post Image Generation

After reviewing and editing your generated posts, clicking Next initiates the final campaign creation process.

Processing stages:

• Creating campaign structure – Setting up the campaign framework
• Processing post content – Finalizing all text and captions
• Setting up posting schedule – Configuring when posts will go live
• Generating images – Creating visual content using your selected templates
• Finalizing campaign – Completing setup

This process generates the actual social media images by combining your content with the selected templates.

Step 7: Review and Approve Posts

Once processing is complete, you’ll see the Edit campaign screen with all your posts ready for review.

Post Preview Cards show:

• Visual Preview: The actual image that will be posted
• Headline and Caption: The text content for each post
• Status: Draft or Approved
• Publishing Schedule: Date and time when the post will go live
• Platform Icons: Which social networks will receive this post

Actions for each post:

• Approve: Mark the post ready for publishing
• Publish: Schedule the post to go live
• Edit: Make last-minute changes (via edit icon)
• Delete: Remove a post (via trash icon)
• Download: Save the image locally (via download icon)

Bulk Actions:

• “Approve All & Schedule” button: Approve all posts at once and activate the campaign

Campaign Confirmation

After approving all posts, you’ll see the final confirmation screen:

“Your campaign is ready to go!”

The Campaign Summary displays:

• Campaign Name: Your campaign title
• Total Posts: Number of posts created
• Approved: Posts ready to publish
• Drafts: Any unapproved posts
• Posts/Day: Daily posting frequency

Schedule Details:

• Start Date: When posting begins
• End Date: When the campaign concludes
• Duration: Total campaign length in days
• Posting Times: Specific times posts will go live

Campaign Configuration:

• Generation Mode: AI Generated or Manual
• Target Platforms: Selected social media accounts

What Happens Next

Once your campaign is approved and scheduled:

1. Automatic Publishing: Posts will be published automatically according to your schedule
2. Campaign Status: Changes from “Draft” to “Active” or “Scheduled” on the Campaigns page
3. Track Progress: Monitor campaign progress from the Campaigns dashboard
4. View Analytics: Check engagement metrics in the Analytics section
5. Make Adjustments: You can pause, edit, or reschedule the campaign at any time

Managing Active Campaigns

Return to the Campaigns page to:

• View all active, scheduled, and completed campaigns
• Monitor posting progress (percentage complete)
• Pause or resume campaigns
• Edit campaign settings or individual posts
• Access performance analytics

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Congratulations! You’ve successfully created and scheduled your first Apaya campaign. Your AI-powered social media content will now be automatically posted according to your schedule.