Five Things to Consider Before Purchasing a Social Media Scheduling Tool
When you Google social media management or scheduling tools, you’re flooded with options and the top results are of course paid ads. So how do you know which tools are worth your time? We’ve put together five thoughts and considerations to make your decision a little easier.
1) Can the tool publish to all social media platforms you’re on?
You’d think that every scheduling tool out there has the ability to publish to all the major platforms. However, that’s not always the case! Some companies have decided to focus on specific platforms and may not have all of the integrations you’re looking for.
In fact, there are a couple of popular ones that will come up in Google that only publish to Instagram. If Instagram is the only platform you’re on or choose to focus on, it might be a good choice for you.
If you’re on multiple social media platforms, you might want to consider one that is more all-encompassing.
2) Does the social media tool have suggested posting times?
Although having suggested posting times are not vital to your success, we can say that after we’ve used them, it’s hard to go back. These tools use AI to see when the majority of your audience is online at the same time, then they suggest posting times to make sure your content is pushed out to your audience when they are most active.
In the competitive social media space, we think if it’s available and in your budget, go for a tool that has it!
3) Does the tool have social media analytics?
Analytics are the key to knowing if your content is resonating with your audience or not. Quite frankly, the analytics dashboards on the most popular platforms are a little confusing. Add on the challenge of combining these numbers together when it’s located and defined slightly differently on each platform and you have yourself a few hours of pulling your hair out.
If the social media tool has an analytics component to it, it’s a major plus. It will aggregate all of the data in an easy-to-export report that you can better understand. Similarly, these tools often have reports that are generated at the click of a button for different date ranges and can easily be compared to previous periods to show growth or decline. This can help you make future decisions with your content planning.
4) How many posts are you “allowed” to schedule ahead of time?
Depending on the subscription package you choose with some of the companies, you may be limited to the number of posts you can schedule out ahead of time.
As we have suggested in previous blog posts, scheduling your social content out ahead of time frees up time for you to work on other parts of your business - which is really the whole point of having a social media scheduling tool in the first place!
To some of you who may be just starting out on your social media journey, scheduling out more than two weeks ahead of time can sound daunting. However, we at Hustle Marketing really believe that the more you post on social media and get to know your audience, the easier it gets to think of content. The more you practice, the better you get. If you’re not quite there yet, no worries. That just means you don’t have to worry about this when choosing a tool!
5) How much do social media scheduling tools cost?
The price per social media tool will vary depending on all of the items we mentioned above and likely how many accounts you are trying to hook up to it. Luckily, there are tools out there for any price range! Many of them offer a free one-week trial.
After narrowing down your options with the items to consider in this blog, you can then try out your front-runners to see which one is the most comfortable for you.