Here is why social media automation tools should be part of your strategic plan to generate more traffic.
With the huge increase of social media platforms, it has become very difficult for small and medium sized businesses to promote daily tweets, posts and articles simultaneously throughout versatile cutting-edge social media communication tools.
Social Media Marketing Automation Tools
The best tools ever to speed up social posting
We’ll show you here how your social media job could become easier. Grab these one or two so you can streamline your social media posting process in less than 10 minutes. Talking per day.
Allow me to say, that the following list is by no means exhaustive.
Due to the nature of the web, prospects know that they can easily scan dozens of websites or social sites before they decide on which service or product to buy. They’ll read other people’s comments and if they like it, then an enquiry or purchase will follow.
So lets move on.
How to effectively advertise with social media tools?
Whether you love or hate it, social media is the most hot and powerful marketing tool on the planet, a bit like a raw diamond asking to be polished. However, we can say from experience that some small sized businesses won’t really benefit from sites such as LinkedIn.
They’ll need to find one or two social media tools that can get their key messages/products or service across as competition is fierce. Twitter is one of the better ways of doing this! Make sure you share and follow up those who support you and vice versa.
But would they have the time to get their message across all of them? Read on.
Why automate social media campaigns?
Some of you are probably wondering what’s the point? Aren’t we supposed to keep a natural and personalised interaction with people, instead of doing social media automation?
Yes, but put it this way, if you and your team have several projects on the go, you might struggle to find the time to tweet or post about your new products or services.
So, let me ask you this – what’s better, doing nothing or creating pre-selected messages that you can automate your media in order to reach your customers or followers twice a day?
Well, I’ve had clients asking me how to do it. That’s why I have created this list I’m sharing with you.
Just a quick note for any business people reading this post. Write your post carefully and remember to add a pinch of common sense into it. Don’t let these tools dictate and detract you from the interactive nature of the social aspect. But you can have all this and automate your posts and short messages.
Don't let social media #tools dictate and detract you from the interactive nature of the social aspect. But you can #automate your posts and short messages Click To TweetBear in mind that there is many tools out there offering a unique set of features, I was initially tempted to suggest one or two, but I won’t, because every business has very specific needs and also these tools will evolve (I hope so).
I’ll let you do the hard way, read, test it and decide which one works best for your business.
15 social media automation tools
1) Alternion
Great tool for monitoring. Surprisingly, it looks like Facebook, but overall very straight forward.
Features:
- Combines all of your social media accounts into one place
- Social hub, email, address book, photo and video inbox
- Enables you to view and gather all of the updates in one feed.
2) Blurtster >>It seems they also close down
Looking to quickly connect with your customers in social media? And want an easy to use tool to help you out, Blurtster is the obvious choice!
Features:
Blurtster allows posts to be scheduled and send out according to your selected timeHas its own craft option to write the perfect messageMultiple profiles and accountsGood Analytics, keyword tracking, IQ score system.. (We haven’t tried).
I am adding a better one to replace the above.
One of the all times best to scale your social media automation efforts.
IFTTT – stands for “if this, then that” is the easiest free tool to get your apps and devices connected.
Here’s how to start
You’ll be offered to sign in with either your Google or FB account or you can also create a unique username and password.
Once you’re in, they’ll ask you to pick three or more devices/services that you want to use often.
The devices could be: Apple, Android, and the platforms you can pick are the ones you often use such as: Instagram, Facebook, etc.
Once you’ve made your choices, you will select/click from a page of services where you can browse IFTTT applets based on the options you selected.
Just browse a wide variety of features, tools and “recipes” (AKA) also known as channels or applets.
Choose one you fancy and just follow the quick screen instructions.
This platform also allows to connect one device to fire up countless posts [paid] in one go.
Let’s say you post an image on FB, it will be automatically backed up to Pinterest via the command “If you post an image on Facebook, Then upload a copy to …..”. Easy.
With over 4000 applets in their arsenal, IFTTT connects 600 apps to (almost) anything no matter where you are – bottom line is, it will save you lots of precious time.
Social media management/automation tool offering you:
- Email Automation – Sends (automatically) emails to people who commented on your blog
- Best video sharing – Create video post, the tool will share the link to your YouTube platform
- Sync Instagram posts to Pinterest– and vice-versa. Post your best pic on Instagram, then the tool will repost it to a pre-selected board on Pinterest
- Share posts on social media channels– whenever you post content on your WordPress, rather than having to connect and share it manually on your social sites, IFTTT will automatically do that for you.
Note: With IFTTT automation tool, you are not restricted to use the default applets. You can create customised ones that fit your personal or business needs.
This tool is fantastic and absolutely free with no limit to what you can do with it.
3) Buffer
Buffer was designed for startups and small businesses. Like the majority it allows you to schedule your posts for Twitter, LinkedIn, G+ & Facebook – and lately they added Instagram to their package.
I also think Buffer is the perfect tool for social media automation, if you’re on a budget.
Features:
- Offers a cool feature called “suggest a tweet” then selects quotes to add to your list of scheduled tweets [ From Aug.2015 onwards this option has been disconnected.]
- You can also install the bookmarklet in any almost any browser. You “buffer” a web page and it adds the article to your pile of tweets. They allow you to “Re-buffer” a prolifique post.
- Easy daily set-up time to fire up your tweets.
- Analysis and Insights on Pro version only.
Cost: [Update] Free for one account with up to 10 Tweets. They only offer paid plans now. Upgrade with 6 accounts including 50 tweets for $10 per month and $99 for an upgrade with unlimited accounts.
4) Bundle Post
Bundle Post is a terrific tool if you’re growing your business or going to be busy sharing a lot and all the time (hash tags, etc).
Features enables you to:
- Post in bulk to multiple networks – definitely this is a great tool to consider if your budget allows
- Evergreen scheduling, Personalization, Auto image resize, Auto schedule
- Auto and Custom RSS messages instead of RSS posts or even add own text (@mentions, hash tags, etc.) to the RSS posts
- 1 hr Consult on quarterly accts
- Great video demonstration of what Bundle Post does on its website
- Very simple structure to follow.
- Extra free features
Plans/Cost: No longer offer free plan. gives you one folder for each service. [Update]
They now offer Business: $39 | Professional:$99 | Enterprise: $199/month with unlimited access/folders.
5) Crowdbooster
Crowd Booster is definitely among the top tools. If you’re looking to analyse live data and measure a major social media campaign, you should try it.
Features enables you to:
- Real time Twitter & Facebook analytics dashboard
- Offers you simplicity & value for money
- Drills down almost everything – from auto posts, reports & stats on how many times tweets were shared or re-tweeted
- Good tracking ( show most engaging followers)
- Best feature – suggestions based on times of the day to post stuff according with latest engagement
- And you can download data to an csv file.
Cost: Starts a $9 per month (1 twitter account + Facebook page) with a 30 days trial.
6) Dlvr.it
Dlvr.it is probably the simplest social media automation tool. You simply log-in (email & password) set-up a group of RSS feeds and decide which social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) you want to reach.
Features enables you to:
- Automatically fires up RSS posts to the pre-selected networks
- Shows you where your campaign/content gets the most attention from
- Feed-burner-powered, automatically pulls the image from a post when posting to Facebook
- Great tool to streamline your content on Twitter.
Cost: It’s completely free and, so far there is no limit to the amount of feeds or networks you can add to it.
7) Gist [Not in business]
Gist no longer exist. offers a sort of social media CRM platform. Very versatile.
Features:
Contact importation from Facebook, Twitter, emailMeasures all interactions within selected platformsGreat tool to see with who you interact the mostTells you who you’re neglecting.
8) Hootsuite
They now accumulate over 10 million subscribers. Yes that’s huge isn’t it? This tool allows to create multiple social account within a single dashboard, where users can visualise and run all their accounts effortlessly.
With lots of potential, it is among the most popular tools we could call it the dashboard management of social media.
Features:
- Integrates with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and Foursquare accounts
- Display a powerful scheduling interface
- Analytics available with business Pro version (only)
- Bonus Features: When managing multiple accounts for your business it will let you customise reports with summary stats, top referrers, most popular & viewed links.
Cost: Hootsuite is free up to five accounts and beyond that they ask you five now 10 [up to 2018] dollars a month.
A must try. They offer you 90 days free trial.
9) Onlywire.com
[2018 update] This tool now offers three packages; Free; Pro and Enterprise.
You can manage teams & multiple users but from the moment you sign in. You can also add up to 20 media accounts. On free version one user can add up to 4 different social media platforms with unlimited schedule posts. Ready to submit and publish your promotional messages.
Features:
- Enables you to promote your brand via 47 social professional networks
- Powerful scheduling interface with customisable share buttons
- Auto submission tools, (Ad Free, rss feeds, developer api’s)
- Data export to build serious reports
- Analytics system (not applicable in free plan)
- Speed & simplicity
- Live support.
Cost: Pro package: one user starting at $9.99/mo – Enterprise plan starts at $99/mo + 5K posts +unlimited users.
10) Social bakers
With Social Bakers you can easily analyze and manage your social media accounts for just £15 per profile.
Search, analyse and/or compare yourself to competitors in your industry. Good friendly design allowing to manage all your social media channels in one single dashboard.
Features:
- Clever dashboard
- Cross-platform publishing
- Reporting & exporting
- Social Media analytics
- Content calendar
- 10-20 Social media profiles
- etc.
Go here to buy Pro plan version
[Ping.fm] We replaced it as it does work anymore
Update: see Marks comment below.
Ping.fm is an easy tool that allows you to generate substantial amount of posts simultaneously throughout networks.
11) Social Mention
Want to know what people are saying about you online? This tool can make it happen.
Features:
- Set-up alerts that let you know when you’ve been mentioned on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, WordPress, You Tube and many other sites
- Great way to find out about what people are saying about your competitors or your industry
- Doesn’t even require you to sign up. (At today’s date)
- Very simple to use.
Cost: Free for a simple search.
12) Social Oomph
With Social Oomph you can manage many things at once. The interface may not be simple or easy to use, but once you get your way around, you’ll be surprise by its functionality, especially for Twitter.
Features:
- Tweet schedule time, like many of others in this market
- Automatically follows those who follow you
- Accept multiple users to help you manage twitter and analytics features
- Great at tracking mentions on Twitter, Facebook, or blogs
- Automatic DM for all twitter users.
- and much more.
Cost: Free basic account, comes with an optional upgrade (not tested) to unlock LinkedIn and Facebook.
13) Triberr
Triberr is probably among the top automate tools around the web and it’s free. You can also pay for sponsored posts if you want to get a bit more exposure. If you’re using a blog for your business,Triberr can really boost your articles by find & engage influencer’s
Features:
- They allow you to join a like-minded group of bloggers and mutually share one another’s RSS blog content via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google+ from one location
- You can also be part of multiple Tribes, but you must be invited into a Tribe, by requesting an invitation to join in.
Cost: None.
14) Tweet Beep
Authorises you to receive preselected keywords, hash tags alerts from Twitter via email.
Cost: Free basic service with a premium ad-free service.
15) Twitter Feed
Twitter Feed is almost identical to Dlvr.it with a bit less features.
Features:
- You can add an RSS feed (including text) and then schedule a time & date to send out your social media platforms
- Platforms accepted: Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn
- Intuitive and easy to use.
Conclusion:
Before you consider any of the above, there is one important thing to note: social media marketing is only the first step in an effective sales process. I believe that social media automation must be used with moderation, whenever your campaigns suggest you to do so. Nothing else matters apart the planning.
What I wrote here is purely the result of reading, learning and testing along the way.
Just follow your (instincts) business’s priorities, needs, customer’s journey, and then schedule your social media automation accordingly.
Do let us know what you think once you’ve tested these tools. I’d love to get an honest feedback or suggestions.
P.S: Comments are only open for a 260 day period.
