6 Unbreakable Rules of Social Media Automation
Trying to be more efficient by leveraging social media automation? The smartest social media marketers know that automation is essential for growing their accounts. But because automation best practices are still a mystery to some people, here are 6 rules of social media automation.
1. Don’t automate everything
First and foremost, don’t automate everything. Some apps let you automate replies and direct messages. Avoid those apps like the plague.
You must appear human when replying to customers and fans. Automated replies stand out like a sore thumb.
2. Only automate your posts
Posts on your business page should be automated. Sitting on Facebook all day waiting for the perfect time to post is a colossal waste of time. Your time is better spent engaging with fans.
One of the best things about social media automation is it gives you the ability to stay consistent and easily manage your social media accounts. Without social media automation, you will fail at this. You won’t be able to post the right content at the right time. You may even forget to post for days or weeks at a time. Instead, automate your posts by scheduling posts to publish automatically, in accordance with your goals.
3. Automate your posts at the ideal times
Here’s where the hard work starts. You should ignore the social media experts who insist they know the best times to post. They don’t! Nobody knows your page better than you do. So dive into your analytics to see when your fans are online.
4. Automate a mix of content types
What types of posts should you automate?
- Questions
- Viral photos
- Videos
- Inspirational quotes
- Fill in the blanks
- Links
- Funny memes
- Your blog posts
The best Facebook page managers publish a wide variety of content each day.
5. Automate your evergreen content
Evergreen content are those posts that stand the test of time. The posts that don’t get outdated and are valuable, regardless of when you publish.
On Facebook, your fans don’t see all your posts. Reposts are an essential part of your Facebook strategy.
6. Maintain a live presence to respond
Scheduling content in advance doesn’t eliminate the need to maintain a live presence on your social media accounts. Never automate activities like these:
- Replies to comments posted on your page
- Answers to questions posted on your page
- Replies to messages posted on your page
- Shared posts
- Your comments on other pages
Managing and reacting to your social media accounts in real time is just as important as automating your posts. In fact, the key to successfully automating your posts is being yourself when you reply to fans. That’s what social media’s all about.
Summary
Hopefully, you now see the value of social media automation. Marketers who automate content aren’t lazy. In fact, these social media managers often operate the best pages around.
The largest companies on social media use tools to automate their posts and you should too. Your time is better spent responding to followers and creating world class posts. And scheduling posts a week or 2 in advance will free up much of your day.
So start automating today!
SOURCE: Post Planner