Before you start
A few things to know:- You need an active Social Media plan to connect accounts. (One exception: if you’ve turned a blog post into a social post using your free Blog-to-Social repurpose, you can connect a single account to publish that one draft.)
- Only project admins can connect or disconnect accounts. If you have view-only access, you’ll see the platform cards but the buttons will be disabled, with a “View only” note explaining that connect and disconnect are limited to admins.
- Connections are per project. Each project keeps its own set of connected accounts, so a post in one project only publishes to that project’s accounts.
How connecting works (and where your accounts live)
theStacc publishes to social platforms through a secure publishing partner (the broker that handles the actual posting to Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and X). When you connect an account, here’s what happens behind the scenes:- You click Connect on a platform. theStacc asks the publishing partner for a sign-in link and gets back an authorization URL plus a one-time security token (called a state token) that protects against tampering.
- A small popup window opens that authorization URL. You sign in to the platform (or to Meta, for Instagram and Facebook) and approve the permissions.
- The platform sends you back to theStacc. theStacc checks that the security token matches the one it issued - if it doesn’t match, or it’s older than 15 minutes, the connection is rejected and you’ll need to start again.
- theStacc then reads your newly connected account from the publishing partner and saves it - the account name, display name, and avatar - and marks the connection Connected.
Connect each platform
Go to Social Media > Settings > Connections and click Connect on the platform you want. A note window opens first with that platform’s specific requirements, then the sign-in popup. Here’s what each one needs.- Click Connect on the Instagram card, then Go to Facebook Business in the popup.
- Authorize through Meta (Instagram connects via Facebook).
- theStacc saves the connection and marks it Connected.
- Your Instagram account must be a Business or Creator account (Personal accounts aren’t supported).
- It must be linked to a Facebook Page.
- On Meta’s permission screen, click Edit access and tick the Page checkbox - Meta hides Pages by default, and missing this is the most common reason a connection silently fails.
- Media is required for every Instagram post. Text-only posts aren’t supported on Instagram.
- Click Connect on the Facebook card, then Go to Facebook Business.
- Authorize and grant access to your Facebook Page.
- theStacc saves the connection and marks it Connected.
- You must be an Admin or Editor of a Facebook Page (not a personal profile - theStacc publishes to Pages).
- The Page should be part of a Business Portfolio, and your personal account needs admin rights to that portfolio.
- Facebook tokens expire fairly often, so you may need to reconnect periodically (see Expired connections below).
- On the permission screen, remember to Edit access and tick the Page checkbox.
- Click Connect on the LinkedIn card, then Go to Connect LinkedIn.
- Authorize and choose your Personal profile or a Company Page.
- theStacc saves the connection and marks it Connected.
- Connect a Personal profile or a Company Page.
- To publish to a Company Page, you must be a Page Admin or Content Admin on it.
- On LinkedIn’s permission screen, allow access to both your personal profile and your organization.
- Note: posts with external links see a 40-50% reach reduction on LinkedIn. A common workaround is to put the link in the first comment instead.
X (Twitter)
- Click Connect on the X/Twitter card, then Go to X/Twitter.
- Authorize the connection.
- theStacc saves the connection and marks it Connected.
- An active X account.
- Duplicate content is rejected by X - each post must be unique.
Connection statuses
Each platform card shows where the connection stands:- Connected - active and ready to publish. The card shows the connected account name and the date you connected it.
- Not Connected - no account linked yet. Click Connect to start.
- Expired - theStacc could no longer find a live account for this platform with the publishing partner. The token may have expired, or the connection was removed on the platform’s side. The button changes to Reconnect (highlighted in amber) so you can re-authorize.
Refreshing connection status
Tokens can expire or be revoked on the platform’s side without theStacc knowing right away. The Refresh button (top-right of the Connections page) re-checks every connection against the publishing partner in real time:- Click Refresh.
- theStacc asks the publishing partner for your project’s currently live accounts and re-syncs each connection.
- Any connection that still has a matching live account is confirmed Connected (and its account name/avatar are refreshed). Any connection with no matching live account is flagged Expired.
- You’ll see a quick summary - how many connections were verified, or how many now need reconnecting.
Account tiers (X free vs. Premium)
X (Twitter) has two character limits depending on your account: 280 characters on the free tier and 25,000 characters on X Premium. theStacc can’t automatically detect which tier your X account is on, so it assumes free (280) by default and uses that for the live character counter and the over-limit warnings in the post editor. If you’re on X Premium, you can switch your X connection’s tier to premium so theStacc stops flagging longer posts as over the limit. (Tiers apply to the character-limit calculation; today this matters for X specifically.)How many accounts you can connect
You can connect up to 10 social profiles through the publishing partner. If you try to connect one more after reaching that limit, theStacc returns a clear message:You’ve reached the maximum number of connected social profiles on the current plan. Contact support to raise the limit.If you see this, contact support to raise the limit, or disconnect a profile you’re no longer using to free up a slot.
Managing connections
Disconnecting an account
On a Connected card, click Disconnect and confirm. theStacc removes the account from the publishing partner and deletes its own record of the connection. You can reconnect at any time. If the publishing partner can’t be reached at that moment, theStacc still removes its local record so you’re never stuck with a connection you can’t clear - and you can reconnect cleanly afterward. Disconnecting stops theStacc from publishing to that account. Any posts already published stay live on the platform.Expired tokens - reconnecting
When a connection shows Expired, the platform has invalidated the sign-in (this is normal and happens most often with Facebook). Click Reconnect on the card and run through the sign-in popup again, exactly like the first time. Once it succeeds, the card returns to Connected and publishing resumes.Troubleshooting
The connection popup closed but nothing connected
This usually means the platform sent back an error during sign-in rather than a connected account. The most common causes:- No Facebook Page - your Facebook account doesn’t have a Page. theStacc publishes to Pages, not personal profiles. Create a Page at facebook.com/pages/create, make sure you’re an Admin, then try again.
- You closed the popup or denied permission - no account is connected. Click Try Again and approve all the requested permissions on the next screen.
- Meta hid your Page - on Meta’s permission screen, click Edit access and tick the Page checkbox. This is the single most common silent failure for Instagram and Facebook.
- LinkedIn Company Page blocked - make sure you’re a Page Admin or Content Admin, and that you allowed access to both your personal profile and your organization.
”Browser blocked the popup”
Your browser blocked the sign-in window. Allow popups for theStacc and click Connect again.”Social publishing is temporarily unavailable” or “Couldn’t reach the social publishing service”
These point at the publishing partner, not your account:- A “temporarily unavailable” message (a sign-in or rate-limit issue on the partner’s side) means it’s a service hiccup you can’t fix directly - wait a moment and try again, or contact support if it persists.
- A “couldn’t reach the service” / network message means the connection to the partner timed out. Check your internet connection and retry.
Related
- Brand & Style - set your brand voice, colors, and image style so connected posts stay on-brand.
- Content & Scheduling - create, edit, and schedule the posts that go out to your connected accounts.
- Overview - how the Social Media module fits together, from generation to publishing.