Do you manage social media platforms and need to post engaging content out of working hours? Read on for your solution. Scheduling tools are used across social media to stay active across all platforms, without the need to work unsociable hours.
Hootsuite is a social media management platform that has several functionalities, including the ability to pre plan and schedule content. In this article we will provide a step by step guide on how you can schedule and plan your content using Hootsuite.
Step one – Adding the content
The first step is selecting the ‘create’ option, this will take you to the screen you see in the following screenshot. As you can see, there is a box named ‘content’, this is where your captions and text, as well as the hyperlink is added. The ‘Publish to’ dropdown is where you select the platform you wish to publish your post. You are able to select more than one platform, however, keep in mind that handles will be different across Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook etc. If you are not including handles in your post, you can select all accounts that are connected to your Hootsuite account.
Step two – Creating the social post
Write or copy and paste your caption for the post, make sure to include hashtags and the correct handles if necessary. Once you start typing in the content box, the post will begin to render as a preview on the right hand side. Here you will be able to see how the post will look once posted live on your chosen platform. At this stage, you can click into the handles and hashtags and check that they are correct. When scheduling posts, it’s always best practise to double check everything. After all, it is likely that you are scheduling posts as you will be out of office or unable to amend something if anything goes wrong.
Step 3 – Scheduling for social media
Next you need to select the date and time you would like for your post to be published. Hootsuite often suggests the best time for your post, however, you are able to choose this yourself if preferred. After checking you are happy with the content, date and time, hit schedule. Don’t worry if you have made a mistake, there is still time to fix the post. Please see step 4 for editing scheduled content.
Step 4 – Viewing your posts on Hootsuite
Once you have scheduled your post, you can find them all in one place on the dashboard. Here you will also be able to see previous live posts across different platforms. This is the screen where you can preview the post and make any amendments if required.
Step 5 – Using the content planner calendar
Lastly, Hootsuite provides a planner which can be found in the side bar, under the calendar icon. You can use this function to filter by the week or month and select the accounts you want to look at.
Hootsuite plans
Hootsuite offer a free plan that allows you to schedule up to five posts at a time. Once the limit has been reached, you will not be able to schedule anymore posts until one or more of your posts have been published. This is a great chance for you to get to know the tool and decide if it is right for you. If you feel that Hootsuite is the answer to all your troubles, you can upgrade to a number of different plans. Please see below a brief overview:
Professional plan
The main features of this plan are the ability to schedule an unlimited amount of posts, with up to 10 social accounts available. However, this plan will be for just one user. The price per month for this plan is £39.
Team plan
This plan allows three users access with up to 20 social accounts and similarly to the professional plan, the function to schedule unlimited posts.
There are more plans to offer, if you would like to find out more about this scheduling tool, click here.
If you found this post useful, check out our other article to learn more about free email marketing tools.