Scheduling Your Social Life
Should you schedule your social media posts?
If it keeps you accountable for actually posting, then the answer is a glaring yes. If you're like me, you don't have a choice. With many clients and many social platforms, there's no way I could stay on top of it all. I try to stay at least one week ahead of the game, scheduling evergreen content (not time-sensitive) and posting timely stuff as/when its needed.
If it schedules posts, I've probably tried it. That's why I wanted to share the platforms that get my stamp of approval. I use a combination of platforms for clients and for myself, depending on their needs. Here they are:
Buffer
I use this for myself. Their approach is similar to mine for drinking – always keep it "topped up" and you're worry-free. Rather than fussing about optimal times to post, Buffer just takes care of it for you. Supporting Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+, it gets my top vote, purely for convenience.
Sprout Social
I use this for clients. Scheduling is the icing on the cake. Sprout is a robust platform for bigger operations, including useful resources for analysis, monitoring and collaboration. It comes with a price tag, but you may be able to justify it, especially if you juggle many accounts.
Call me old-fashioned, but there's something that feels better by scheduling Facebook posts within the actual site, as opposed to a third-party service. Some argue it's also better for Edgerank performance. As well, they just updated their interface to suck less, so it's worth checking out.
Hootsuite
I often describe it as the Dell of social media scheduling – it's ugly, but it works. It's my least favorite option because I despise the interface, but it will do the job for Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ Pages, and more. And it's free.
Those are my picks, but there are obviously lots of options out there. Have a favorite platform that I missed? Please share. I'm a sucker for efficiency.
