How to make carousels with AI that look like yours

You already answer the same few client questions every week, and a carousel turns one answer into something people save. Most AI carousel advice is a list of prompts, though ^[1]. You paste them every time, fix the colours every time, and end up designing by hand, only slower.

A system decides the look once. Your brand sheet holds the colours, the fonts and how you talk, and five steps hand off to each other. You approve each carousel and the rules do the rest.

1. Study carousels that worked in your field and write down how they're built.
2. Pick one idea for one buyer and write a cover in three parts.
3. Write and design the slides inside your brand sheet.
4. Lay every slide out side by side, fix what's off, then post.
5. End on a comment keyword and read the results after 48 hours ^[1].

Carousels earn their place even if you already film. A video wins on reach, and a carousel wins on saves and shares, because people keep it to come back to ^[2]. Once the system is set up, budget about 30 minutes per carousel ^[2].

Collect 10 to 20 carousels in your field that beat their creator's usual numbers ^[1]. Saves and shares tell you more than likes ^[1], because a save means someone plans to come back. Start with your own saved folder. It's already been filtered by someone a lot like your buyer ^[1].

Look outside your field too. A family lawyer can learn plenty from the way a fitness coach lays out a step-by-step carousel, as long as the shape fits what you teach.

After ten carousels, the patterns start to repeat ^[1], and those patterns become your template. You don't have to take the notes yourself. Paste screenshots into ChatGPT or Claude with this prompt:

Here are screenshots of [number] carousels that did well in my field ([your field]). The people I want to reach are [who you help].

For each carousel, tell me:
- the hook type
- the cover formula (the shape of the words, not the words)
- what each slide does, in order
- the one visual on each slide
- what the last slide asks for

Then tell me the 3 patterns that repeat most, and one thing none of them do that I could own.

Describe the structure only. Don't copy their wording, their numbers or their examples.

Pick one idea for one buyer. Then run the buyer test: take the tool names out of the idea and ask whether your buyer would still care ^[1]. If they wouldn't, turn the idea toward a problem they already have.

Then write the cover in three parts ^[1]:

That payoff is easy to prove: the next slide shows the same room shot from the doorway and from the corner. No number you can back yet? Make the payoff what the reader will be able to do, and show it on a slide, because a cover number you can't back costs you more than it earns ^[1].

Every content slide gets the same four parts and nothing else ^[1]:

Leave out numbered boxes, page counters and clip art ^[1]. One accent colour does all the pointing. A second highlight colour appears once in the whole carousel, on the most important number ^[1].

The words on each slide do the teaching, so make them readable on a phone at arm's length: strong contrast, nothing near the edges, and never a paragraph, since the caption line is for that. In-image text can carry data too, like one big number with its source in small type, a before and after, or a short timeline. A consultant might show two bars for a client's month, before and after.

Pick visuals your clients would recognise from their own week. A lawyer can show the clause itself, a coach the habit tracker, an agent the floor plan with one wall marked. Each visual should show what its sentence says, and a stock photo of a handshake shows nobody anything.

The brand sheet is what makes every carousel look like yours. Fill it in once, then paste it into every carousel prompt, or save it as project instructions in Claude or custom instructions in ChatGPT.

BRAND SHEET

Who I talk to: [who you help, in one line]
What I sell: [your offer, in one line]
Proof I can back: [numbers you can show, and where each one comes from. Write "none" if you have none yet]
How I talk: [3 words, plus 2 captions I wrote myself]

Background: [hex]
Text: [hex]
Muted text: [hex]
Accent (second headline line, one element per visual): [hex]
Highlight (once per carousel, on the most important number): [hex]
Fonts: headings [font], body [font]

Rules: 4:5 portrait, centred layout, one visual per slide, no page counters, no clip art, my handle small at the bottom.

The proof line stops the AI from inventing results, and your two captions give it your rhythm to copy. Still sounds like a machine? See how to make AI writing sound human.

Ask for the words first, with three covers to pick the strongest hook from:

Using the patterns above and my brand sheet below, write a 7-slide carousel about [idea] for [who it's for].

Cover: a small lead-in, a huge payoff of 16 characters or fewer, a named method, and one line on what it does. Give me 3 cover options with different hooks.

Slides 2 to 6: a 2-line headline (20 characters per line at most), one subhead line, ONE visual described in a sentence, and one caption line.

Slide 7: "Comment [KEYWORD]" and exactly what they get.

Then the post caption: line 1 repeats the cover promise, then 3 to 6 short lines, then the keyword ask.

My proof: [a number I can back, or "none"]. Never invent numbers, clients or results.

[paste brand sheet]

Got a video that already did well? Paste its script above the brand sheet and start the prompt with "Using my video script below" instead ^[2]. The hook in that script has already been tested on real viewers. Going the other way works as well. Each slide's headline and caption become one beat of a short video script you can film, as in how to make Reels.

Then design the slides one at a time, with an image model that renders text, such as GPT Image or Nano Banana, or by asking Claude to build them as HTML to screenshot ^[1].

Design slide [n] of this carousel as a 1080 x 1350 image. Follow my brand sheet exactly.

Slide text: [paste the slide's headline, subhead and caption]

Centred layout. Put the second line of the headline in my accent colour. ONE visual: [describe the visual]. Everything else in neutral tones. No extra text, no logos, no page numbers.

[paste brand sheet]

Rather not prompt an image model slide by slide? The Postmosis carousel maker turns a post, pasted text or a topic into 2 to 10 slides in your brand colour with your headshot, and downloads them as 1080 x 1350 pictures or one PDF for LinkedIn.

There are six ways to get from words to slides. Choose by how many carousels you make a week and how many evenings you'll give to design:

A typical automation stack has four parts: an AI model that turns one topic into a slide plan, a design tool that renders the slides, a table where you review them before anything posts, and Make or n8n connecting the three ^[3]. To automate, start with the parts that repeat:

1. Save the brand sheet and the four prompts in a Claude project or a custom GPT, so one message runs the write step.
2. Ask Claude for one HTML slide template in your colours, then drop each new carousel's text into it.
3. Keep a sheet with one row per idea (topic, buyer, keyword), and let the workflow send each row through the stack ^[3].
4. Read every slide yourself before it goes up, and answer the comments yourself.

Automation can't run the buyer test, back up a number or spot the typo an image model put on your cover, so keep a review step in any build. At one carousel a week, the first two steps are enough. The full workflow pays off once you make several a week.

Score every carousel on these 14 points before you post, and keep it only if it hits 11 or more ^[1].

[ ] 1. The cover payoff fits on one line
[ ] 2. The cover names the method
[ ] 3. It passes the buyer test: it still matters with the tool names taken out
[ ] 4. Every headline is 2 lines or fewer
[ ] 5. One visual per slide
[ ] 6. Each visual shows what its sentence says
[ ] 7. The highlight colour appears once
[ ] 8. The proof is real, or honestly absent
[ ] 9. No invented numbers on any mockup or screenshot
[ ] 10. The slide order follows a pattern that worked
[ ] 11. The ask promises one specific thing
[ ] 12. The keyword is one word
[ ] 13. Caption line 1 repeats the cover promise
[ ] 14. It reads the way you talk

For point 14, read the slides aloud ^[1]. Rewrite any line you wouldn't say to a client sitting across the table from you.

Then approve, then post. Lay the slides out side by side, read them in order, fix what's off, and approve ^[1]. The order should follow the pattern from your winners.

End the carousel on a slide that asks for one comment keyword, and say exactly what people get for it: "Comment LEASE and I'll send you the clause checklist." When someone comments, send the resource in a DM with one question about their situation ^[1].

Send those DMs by hand while the comments are a handful a day, or connect a DM tool that answers the keyword. Either way, the keyword on the slide, in the caption and in the tool has to be the same word, or the lead is lost ^[1].

After 48 hours, log four numbers: saves, shares, keyword comments and DM replies ^[1]. Keep the hooks that won and feed them into your next round of research. Then ask the AI what to make next:

Here are my last [number] carousels, with saves, shares, keyword comments and DM replies after 48 hours:

[paste one row per carousel: topic, hook type, cover formula, the four numbers]

Which hook types and cover formulas beat my median? What should my next 3 carousels be? Change one thing per post, so I can see what moved the number.

Saves but no keyword comments usually means the last slide asks for too much or offers too little, so make the resource smaller and more specific. Neither saves nor comments? Go back to the buyer test before you touch the design.

When one carousel beats your usual numbers, stay on it. Make 5 more on the same topic, each with a new hook and a new angle ^[1]. The repurposing playbook works the same way for videos.

On Instagram, one carousel holds up to 20 photos and videos ^[4]. The shape you choose applies to every slide ^[4], so export them all at the same size. You get one caption for the whole post ^[4], and you can't add slides after you've shared it ^[4]. Videos inside a carousel don't count as reels and won't appear in the Reels tab ^[4]. The tap-by-tap steps are in how to make an Instagram carousel.

On LinkedIn, post the carousel as a PDF document, which usually reaches more people than images ^[1]. LinkedIn takes documents up to 100MB and 300 pages ^[5], and every page of a PDF has to be the same size ^[5]. Give the document a title so people know what it is ^[5]. Anyone who can see the post can download it as a PDF ^[5], and you can't swap the file once it's posted ^[5]. See how to post a carousel on LinkedIn for the steps.

Plan each carousel for a day on the Postmosis content calendar, and your phone gets an alert when it's due, so finished slides don't sit forgotten in a downloads folder.

Stuck for a topic? These carousel ideas suit anyone who sells their own know-how, and each one fits the slide rules above.

Run each idea through the buyer test before you write it. For more starting points, try the Instagram post ideas template and the content ideas playbook. For cover lead-ins, the free hook generator gives you openings to adapt, and the video hooks playbook explains the hook types that hold attention on video and slides alike.