If you and your social media department are not properly using monitoring and scheduling tools as part of your social media strategy, then you are probably doing a lot more work than what needs to be done manually, while also probably not catching everything. Social media monitoring and scheduling tools can help you stay on top of messages that you need to respond to, figure out what type of content does best on your channels, and make sure you have a social media presence, even though you may not be in the office.
The Benefits of Scheduling
Scheduling out all your social media not only helps to have a presence when you’re not there (this is especially the case if your target audience is active in the evenings or on the weekends), but it also helps keep your editorial calendar a lot more organized and eliminates the stress with having to remember to post messages in real time, exactly when you had planned.
Scheduling can also help you:
- Work with other departments to ensure that all messages are approved ahead of time
- Ensure that all messages are sent out, simply by scheduling them all at once for a specific period of time
- Makes it easier to visualize and make changes when all messages are laid out in a digital format and changes can be made in real time before the posts go out (instead of after they are already published)
Of course, scheduling is only one part of the equation. Monitoring what people are saying about your brand online (both in response to your content and as part of original content), is crucial to having a successful social media strategy.
Why Monitoring Helps Your Customer Service and Your Content Departments
Social media monitoring not only helps companies create better relationships with their current and potential customers, it also helps companies figure out what their clientele are looking for when it comes to their industry. Monitoring mentions of your brand (along with high-level keywords that are good descriptors of your products and services) can help you find ideas for content and further product development.
Many companies also have merged their customer service and social media department, and have created specific teams that handle customer service inquiries that come through directly from social media. Because many users now use Twitter and Facebook as a way to ask for help, it’s important that your company is listening.
The 3 Keys to Organization: Working Together
Of course, social media monitoring and scheduling go hand-in-hand towards creating a cohesive strategy that may work between multiple departments. For example, if the marketing department is in charge of content strategy, they can connect with the customer service representatives that are handling requests on Twitter to receive what are the most asked questions. Answering these could be a great blog poster white paper.
In addition, making sure that all departments involved in social media have an interconnected response strategy can help make sure that the brand’s online presence is unified across all networks, no matter where the user may be accessing them from first.
When departments work together, social media strategy is only strengthened, as all departments have a unique point of view that is useful to the bigger picture of a brand’s success.
Scheduling and Monitoring Resources
Here are some non-commissioned recommendations for tools to check out. Be sure to try out a few to figure out what works best for you and your company.
Screenshot of Buffer’s analytics screen taken 5/12/2014- Buffer: Schedule out posts in a queue format, where the top post goes out at the next scheduled time that you preset. Free and paid versions are available and users can connect to Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google+.
- HootSuite: This interface allows you to create columns to monitor keywords, #, or account mentioned across several social media platforms, just like Buffer. Free and paid versions are also available.
- Social Mention: A free social monitoring website that monitors the sentiment and mentions of a specific keyword or phrase
- Topsy: Another free social monitoring website that shows the most popular social media posts for specific keyword first
Not only should scheduling and monitoring be a key component of a successful social media strategy, implementing tools like Buffer or Social Mention can be useful for many departments and employees, from copywriters to customer service representatives. By utilizing the same social media tools, different departments can work together to create a strong online presence for your company.