For the last couple of years, I’ve been using Chatbooks to create a series of mini books with snippets from our family life. I first came across Chatbooks from their hilarious and clever viral video advertisement.
You can create photo books by uploading images from various sources (including your social media accounts) like many other photo book providers. However the beauty of Chatbooks is their book series (via their mobile app) that is synced with your Instagram account. I have a private Instagram account that I use specifically for this purpose. I have a subscription which means each time I upload 60 photos to Instagram, it creates a mini book.
Every now and again, I check the Chatbook app to see where it is up to, and if I want to delete any photos from the mini book or make any edits like captions/cover etc. The app is straightforward and easy to use. You will get an email notification 3 days before each book goes to print so you can make any changes.
Below is a screen shot of one of my books in the app.
I rarely make many changes to captions etc. because that’s the beauty of it — most of it is automatic. It draws the date, caption and image from my Instagram account and puts a book together for me. Every couple of months, I get a book in the mail! Having a hard copy is lovely, and the kids LOVE it. I often find them reading through the books that live in our living area.
This gives you an indication of the size of the 6 x 6 inch book.
I think the books are quite affordable ($10 US for the soft cover book and $15 for hard cover). I am happy with the quality of the books and print quality for the price I am paying for 60-photo-book. I started the subscription with the soft cover version (the book on the right), however I found that spine of the book didn’t hold the pages well (they were prone to come apart, especially since the kids read them so often). I upgraded to the hardcover option and the quality is HEAPS better. Plus the hardcover looks lovely on the shelf/coffee table. Considering I get about a book every couple of months, I felt it was worth paying the extra.
I did a quick video about the differences between the soft cover and hard cover.
January is a good time to start a series. My recommendation is to start a private Instagram account dedicated for this purpose which makes it all quite effortless.
Discount Code
If you want $10 off your first order, I’ve created a code with my account. Just use the code BEAFUNMUM.
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