…or anyone who manages social media accounts.
I am frequently asked by clients, what’s the best tool for scheduling, what the best tool for analytics, what are the best tools for social media etc. So I thought I’d write a blog on the tools I couldn’t do my job without.
This list isn’t just for social media managers, it’s for anyone who manages social media accounts for brands, voluntary organisation or interests in their spare time. Some of the tools have free versions, but in many cases I use the paid versions for the extra functionality. But use the free ones in the first instance to see how you get on.
Hope you find them useful, save time and get better results.
1. Facebook Creator Studio - FREE
Facebook Creator Studio is what I use for publishing and scheduling all Facebook and Instagram posts, including videos and IGTV. It’s accessed from the top navigation bar on your Facebook page, where you can also access Facebook Insights and the inbox.
It gives you full functionality and is easy for clients to go in and approve scheduled posts. Toggle between the Facebook and Instagram icon at the top of the page to change network.
2. HootSuite – PAID
I’ve been using Hootsuite for the last seven years and is super reliable. I use it for:
Scheduling Twitter and LinkedIn posts (you can use it for other social media networks too, but I use Creator Studio for Insta and Facebook). Twitter recently announced scheduling but I haven’t had a great experience with this so far
Social listening. You can set up streams to monitor keywords and hashtags
Community management. Replying to comments and DMs.
Bulk uploading tweets
Hootsuite also spouts out analytics, has a huge range of plugins and apps and I set up contact centres to run social customer service using it.
3. Get Emoji - FREE
Nearly every post I issue has an emoji, so I use Get Emoji to quickly search, copy and paste the emoji I need.
4. Canva Pro - PAID
What can Canva not do?! For as little as £10.99 per month you can become close to a graphic designer. They have loads of templates for social media posts, basic animation and it’s quick to resize graphics for other channels. You can also create teams to share work with others.
If you are a voluntary organisation you can sign up to Canva Pro for free as part of their nonprofits program.
5. WhatAGraph - PAID
Waste no more time on spreadsheets, trying to compare different social networks’ performance to each other!
Connect your social networks and other digital channels such as Google Analytics to WhatAGraph and it spouts out easily digestible reports. You can spend more time analysing performance and optimising your social media activity.
6. Linktree – FREE & PAID
There’s no bout it - one Instagram bio link is not enough. Replace your bio link with a Linktree link that basically sets up a web page with a list of links that are easy to navigate too.
The free version should be enough, but upgrade to the pro version for customisable options such as link scheduling, social icons, thumbnails and detailed analytics. Your Linktree link can also be used on email footers, Twitter bio, LinkedIn profile etc.
Another alternative to Linktree is Later.
7. Hex Colour Picker - FREE
Social media is all about the graphics. If you need to match a colour exactly and don’t know the HEX colour code simply upload the original image to Image Color Picker and click on the colour and it will throw out the # HEX code. Super useful when creating graphics in Canva.
8. InShot
Everyone knows video gets more engagement on social media and InShot is a super handy video editor for editing videos on the fly. Great for making animated videos out of photos, picture collages, adding captions, resizing etc.
9. Handy Instagram Tools
For making your Insta Stories stand out these are good Apps to use:
HypeType for animated text on Instagram Stories
When To Post for finding out the best time to post on Instagram
10. Resizing video
A quick tool for resizing video for different social media channels is Kapwing. It also has lots of other tools such as a subtitler, meme generator etc,
And there’s more….
It goes without saying that Facebook Ads and Twitter Ads are an essential in a social media manager’s toolbox for reaching people at all stages in the marketing funnel. Plus an easy to use and update Content Calendar is essential for keeping track of all your content.
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