13 Social Media Tools For Businesses
You’re done writing a social media strategy. You’re probably pretty well-versed in Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and so on. Perhaps you’re exploring newer networks like Instagram and Pinterest too.
Well done, you. But the world of social media doesn’t stand still, and it can take all your time just to keep on top of all your communication channels. Here, then, are (a not at all unlucky) 13 social media tools you shouldn’t live without – all to help make your social media life just that little easier.
Hootsuite dashboard
Hootsuite is the go-to social media management platform for a lot of people and allows you to view all your Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or Google Plus posts on the same screen. So, for example, you might have a page set up showing your Twitter feed, sent Tweets and results for a hashtag you’re interested in, as well as the latest posts from your Facebook wall. There are some powerful analytics tools too – although these cost – letting you see your most popular links, follower growth and so on. A great addition to any SM strategy.
A Twitter-only tool – did you guess? – but one that’s incredibly useful. It shows you how many tweets you’ve sent over a specified period, how many people have retweeted you over the same time frame, which users retweet you most and the time of day people interact with your tweets most. There’s also a cool ‘mention map’, which drops icons onto a global map to show you where the people who interact with you live. Great stuff. Speaking of mentioning…
Like Google Alerts, but for social media. Ask Mention to alert you whenever someone mentions your brand on any social media site, and it’ll buzz you whenever it happens. A terrific monitoring tool.
One of the best tools around for scheduling your Tweets, Facebook posts and LinkedIn updates. It’s easy and straightforward to write different posts for different sites ahead of time, and schedule them for any point within the next seven days.
There are so many social media sites you might want to use, and it’s important to keep your brand name the same across them all to avoid confusion. For instance, a fishing supply company might want /topfishingtackle as the suffix to their addresses across Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, Vimeo, WordPress and so on. Using Know Em means you don’t have to go to each individual site to check the availability of your proposed username – instead, you can just enter it into Know Em and it’ll search them all to tell you whether or not it’s already been taken on each.
You probably know all about how useful Google Analytics can be for keeping tracks of users and clicks on your website, but it’s equally handy for doing the same on your blog page. You’ll soon know which posts get the most interest, and where from. Likewise, you can also now track social traffic in Analytics, supporting the popular theory that Google is indeed starting to give social more weight and it’s now one of the most SMM tools available for free.
Knowing exactly when your followers are most likely to be online is super-useful, because it means that you can time your Tweets for when they’re most likely to be seen and interacted with. Tweriod can tell you exactly that, and lets you export that data to Excel or as a PDF.
Storify allows you to take a bunch of Tweets on any topic, sorted by hashtag, and turns them into a lovely looking, easy to digest, chart – including images and videos – which can then be shared elsewhere on the net (they look great on Pinterest). It lets you, for instance, see the full story of that important conference as it unfolded – what happened, what were people saying, did you get the results you needed from the event? It’s fantastic for seeing just what people think of your products or services.
We mentioned Pinterest just then – it’s one of the fastest-growing social networks around. It works by placing a ‘Pin It’ button on your toolbar for you to click whenever you see a page with a great image on it. JQuery, however, allows you to pin an image simply by hovering your mouse cursor over it – making the whole process that tiny, but essential, bit quicker. Vital if Pinterest is central to your social media strategy.
Facebook’s fantastic, but it’s easy to overlook any captions beneath images if you’re flipping quickly between shots. PicMonkey allows you to quickly and easily add copy onto pictures before posting, without any awkward messing about in PhotoShop.
Now that hashtags have transcended Twitter and moved on Facebook and Google Plus, you need a tool that lets you search for hashtags across multiple social media. Enter Tagboard, which does… well, exactly that. Find out if that topic you’re interested in is being discussed across multiple media by searching for its hashtag on Tagboard.
Who influences your audience? Whoever it is, it’s sensible to take an interest in their interests – and that’s what Brook is handy for. It lets you set up a list of key influencers, and sends you an email each day summarising the most popular tweets they’ve sent. And that means you can tailor your tweets to them, and there’s more chance of them promoting your content to your target audience.
Those of you who use YouTube or Daily Motion a lot should be using Leadplayer. It’s a very quick and easy tool that lets you slap a call to action onto your videos before you upload them – for instance, you could ask people to enter their email address to subscribe to your newsletter, or simply insert a ‘visit our website here’ message. Sorted.
That’s 13 social media tools to really boost your online effort – play around with them and see what works for you. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg – a Google search will reveal stacks of other toys to try, and new ones launch endlessly.
Social media never stands still, so you can’t afford to either.
Jason
I'm an internet Marketer with a love for online business. Get in touch if you need a helping hand with Internet marketing, SEO or Business
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