Have you ever wondered how some businesses manage to have consistent content on all of their social media platforms? Chances are they use a social media management tool (or a combination of a few), which is basically a scheduler for your social media posts (though they are much more than just a scheduler).
How do you find the best social media scheduler for your business? In this post, I share my own experience with several, and share an informative infographic that rates the top 5 best social media management tools available; Agora Pulse, Sprout Social, Buffer, Sendible and Hootsuite.
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Why should I schedule social media posts?
Scheduling your social media posts does a couple things:
- provides consistent content all week/month
- saves time by batching graphics and posts
- saves more time because you spend less time ‘looking around’ and browsing for content
- gives you more time during the week to interact and engage with your community
When you use a social media scheduler, it helps you to be more consistent on any social media platform, because you can choose one day a week or month, sit down to create your graphics and posts, schedule them, and then it’s done.
You still want to monitor throughout the week to make sure you are answering questions and interacting with your followers, but you know that your accounts are being updated daily (or however often you decide works best for your business).
I still see the value of ‘posting on the fly’ when you find a great article to share, or something happens in your industry or city that would be great to share with your audience, but this is like ‘bonus’ content to share.
How do I choose the best scheduler for my business?
There are many social media scheduler to use for your business. In fact, if you are only using Facebook, you might want to use the built-in scheduler that works in the same way as the most popular schedulers.
The difference between using a social media management platform is that they often come with added bonuses.
Hootsuite, for example, has a scheduling option available, but it’s also a social media dashboard, where you can monitor multiple platforms including mentions, messages, comments, etc.
Use Hootsuite to schedule and to monitor your social media accounts.
I personally use Hootsuite and Buffer, but have used Sendible for a client, and have checked out Agora Pulse and Sprout Social. If you are a big Twitter user, another option is Tweet Deck, and for me, I use a combination of Buffer and Hiplay to keep my Twitter account consistent.
Tweet Deck looks very similar to Hootsuite and helps keep your Twitter account consistent and helps you monitor your feed.
To choose the best platform for you and your business, I suggest testing out a couple until you find one that you like, that is easy for you to use, and is in your price range. Most of the tools offer either free accounts, or free for a few days so you can test them out.
Need more details on the best social media scheduler for your business? G2Crowd, a business software and services review company, and Ian Anderson Gray, created an infographic (below) using reviews and data to rate the top 5 social media dashboards based on those reviews.
Infographic brought to you by Seriously Social and G2 Crowd
Do you use a social media management tool? Which one works best for your business?
