<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can automate social media with Claude Code by installing the open-source That’s the short version. Here’s the part that matters: this isn’t a chatbot that writes captions and stops. Claude Code is Anthropic’s agentic coding CLI, and with the right plugin it can actually take action across 10 social platforms. You describe the outcome, it figures out the steps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This guide walks through the full setup and four real workflows you can copy today. We’ll show the exact prompts you type to Claude and the underlying Key Takeaways<\/strong><\/p>\n\n Dashboards make you do the work. You open the tab, pick the account, write the caption, upload the media, set the time, and hit schedule. Repeat for every post, every platform, every week. The tool helps, but you’re still the one clicking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An AI agent flips that. You state the goal once, and it executes the steps. The difference is who holds the workflow in their head: you, or the agent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here’s a concrete before-and-after. Posting an image to Instagram from a dashboard means generating the image somewhere, downloading it, uploading it, writing the caption, and scheduling. Five steps, maybe three minutes, across two tools. With Claude Code and A few reasons this approach wins for small teams:<\/p>\n\n\n If you want the bigger picture on where this fits, our social media automation guide<\/strong> covers the strategy side. This article is the hands-on how-to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Three things. None of them take long to set up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Claude Code installed.<\/strong> Claude Code is Anthropic’s agentic CLI for the terminal. If you’ve used it for coding, this is the same tool\u2014you’re just pointing it at social media instead of a codebase. It supports plugins and MCP (Model Context Protocol), which is how external tools like 2. A Simplified account.<\/strong> You’ll need an active account to connect your social profiles and generate content. The free plan<\/a> lets you connect 3 social accounts and test the workflow before you commit to anything. Connect your Instagram, LinkedIn, or whichever platforms you post to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. A Simplified API key.<\/strong> This is what authorizes the CLI to act on your account. Go to Simplified.com, open Settings, find API Keys, and generate one. Copy it somewhere safe\u2014you’ll set it as an environment variable in a moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s the whole list. You don’t need to write code, understand MCP internals, or read API documentation. The plugin and its bundled skill handle the technical details.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are two ways to install Inside Claude Code, add the marketplace and install the plugin:<\/p>\n\n\n\n This registers the plugin with Claude Code. The big advantage here: the plugin ships with a Claude Code skill<\/strong>, a bundled instruction set that teaches the agent exactly how to use every command. You don’t have to explain how posting or analytics work. The agent already knows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you’d rather have the binary available system-wide, install it globally with npm:<\/p>\n\n\n\n This gives you a Either way, the CLI needs your API key to authenticate. Export it as an environment variable:<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s it. To confirm everything connected, ask Claude to list your accounts:<\/p>\n\n\n\n You type:<\/strong>\u00a0“List my connected social accounts.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Claude runs:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n The command returns JSON with each connected account and its ID. You’ll use those account IDs to target specific platforms. Keep them handy\u2014or just let the agent look them up each time, since it can re-run Want to understand how this compares to calling the API directly? Our guide on\u00a0posting to social media via API<\/a>\u00a0covers the raw approach. The CLI wraps all of that so you don’t have to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here’s where it gets practical. Each workflow below shows the plain-English prompt you give Claude and the This is the headline use case: one prompt, image to published queue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You type:<\/strong>\u00a0“Generate a realistic sunset image over a city skyline, then post it to my Instagram with the caption ‘Golden hour in the city.'”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n The agent breaks this into two steps. First it generates the image. Because image generation runs asynchronously, it returns a When that finishes, the command returns the image URL in its JSON output. The agent grabs that URL and creates the post, queuing it to your Instagram account:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Two commands, one sentence from you. The agent handled the handoff between image generation and posting on its own. If you want a different look, you change the prompt\u2014”minimalist flat illustration” or “moody black-and-white photo”\u2014and the agent adjusts the Planning ahead is where automation earns its keep. Instead of scheduling seven posts by hand, describe the week and let the agent queue them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You type:<\/strong>\u00a0“Draft 5 LinkedIn posts about remote team productivity, one per weekday, and add them all to my queue.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n The agent writes five captions (this is where Claude’s writing ability does the heavy lifting), then runs …and so on for all five. Each call returns JSON confirming the post was queued, so the agent can report back exactly what it scheduled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Need to change one? Ask Claude to list your scheduled posts and update the one you want:<\/p>\n\n\n\n You type:<\/strong>\u00a0“Show me my queued LinkedIn posts and reword Wednesday’s to be more casual.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Claude runs:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\nsimplified-cli<\/code> plugin, setting your Simplified API key, then telling Claude what you want in plain English. Type “generate a sunset image and post it to Instagram,” and the agent runs the right commands, waits for the image to render, and queues the post. No dashboard, no tab-switching, no manual export.<\/p>\n\n\n\nsimplified<\/code> commands the agent runs, so you can see what’s happening under the hood and reproduce it on your own accounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\nsimplified-cli<\/code>\u00a0plugin and set\u00a0SIMPLIFIED_API_KEY<\/code>. Then describe tasks in plain English and the agent runs the commands.<\/li>\n\n<\/span>Why automate social media with an AI agent instead of a dashboard<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
simplified-cli<\/code>, you type one sentence and the agent does all five.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
<\/span>What you need before you start<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
simplified-cli<\/code> connect to it. Check Anthropic’s documentation if you haven’t installed it yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/span>Install the simplified-cli plugin and set your API key<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
simplified-cli<\/code>. Pick whichever fits how you work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/span>Option A: Install as a Claude Code plugin (recommended)<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\/plugin marketplace add celeryhq\/simplified-cli\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n<\/span>Option B: Install via npm<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
npm install -g simplified-cli\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsimplified<\/code> command you can run directly in any terminal, and Claude Code can call it too. Use this if you also want to script tasks outside of Claude.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/span>Set your API key<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
export SIMPLIFIED_API_KEY=your_key_here\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsimplified accounts:list\n<\/code><\/pre>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\naccounts:list<\/code> whenever it needs an ID.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/span>Real workflows: prompts you type and commands Claude runs<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
simplified<\/code> commands the agent runs to make it happen. These are reproducible\u2014set up the plugin, then try them on your own accounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/span>Workflow 1: Generate an image and post it to Instagram<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
task_id<\/code>, so the agent uses --wait<\/code> to hold until the image is ready:<\/p>\n\n\n\nsimplified ai-image:generate --model flux.flux-realism --prompt \"realistic sunset over a city skyline, golden hour\" --wait\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsimplified posts:create -c \"Golden hour in the city.\" -a \"<instagram_account_id>\" --action add_to_queue --media \"<generated_image_url>\"\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n--prompt<\/code> value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/span>Workflow 2: Schedule a week of posts<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
posts:create<\/code> once per post, adding each to the queue:<\/p>\n\n\n\nsimplified posts:create -c \"Remote work isn't about location. It's about trust...\" -a \"<linkedin_account_id>\" --action add_to_queue\nsimplified posts:create -c \"Async updates beat status meetings for one reason...\" -a \"<linkedin_account_id>\" --action add_to_queue\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\nsimplified posts:list -a \"<linkedin_account_id>\"\nsimplified posts:update <post_id> -c \"New casual caption...\"\n<\/code><\/pre>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n