Social media scheduling tools allow you to schedule posts in advance, manage these posts and automate the publishing process. The simplest scheduling tools only allow you, well, to schedule posts. But the best social media scheduling tools have a range of tools at their disposal to help you not only schedule posts but boost your overall social media marketing effectiveness. In this article, we analyze the top 8 tools and how they can help you and your marketing team.
Best Social Media Scheduling Tools
1) eclincher
If you are looking for the best social media tool & scheduler, then look no further than this social media marketing tool. eclincher is equipped with a suite of comprehensive tools to help auto-schedule social media posts, manage posts from its user-friendly social media calendar, curate content with RSS feeds and keywords, and employ social media monitoring with the help of powerful tools and analytics to optimize your social media campaigns for increased effectiveness.
Additionally, this social media management tool makes managing all your social media interactions much easier, thanks to its unified social inbox. Overall, eclincher is the best social media scheduling tool I have tested in a long time. It not only makes my posting easier but makes the posts better.
What I liked most about eclincher is probably the fact that you do not need to spend a ton of time learning the tool. It’s plain, simple, and very effective – all you need in a social media scheduling tool.
2) CoSchedule
This versatile social media management platform helps you streamline the content-posting process for major social media platforms. You can schedule posts and manage them from a drag-and-drop calendar. You can also track their performance on a specific social media platform with CoSchedule’s analytics. It can also act as a social media account finder as well.
Like eclincher, CoSchedule also offers integrations with a plethora of marketing tools. Overall, a great tool if you need to manage multiple accounts.
3) Feedly
Although Feedly’s primary use is for content curation, it can still be used as a tool for scheduling posts when you integrate it with eclincher, CoSchedule, Buffer, or Hootsuite.
I love using Feedly for curating content – it saves me a ton of time! You can easily organize and follow your favorite sources you want to track on social platforms and create collections and build marketing strategies around them. It also offers great collaboration tools – helping your team work more efficiently. Overall, if content curation is your primary objective, then opt for this tool.
4) Sked Social
Sked Social is another great option for scheduling posts on your social media accounts. Although Sked Social is designed for Instagram, I used it on Facebook and LinkedIn as well. You can plan and schedule your posts, automate the posting process, and manage all your posts from a single drag-and-drop calendar. You can also monitor social media effectively with this tool!
5) Planable
Planable takes social media post planning to the next level thanks to its intuitive content calendar. Simply create and schedule your social media posts and manage everything relating to your posts from the calendar – it even supports managing multiple social media accounts.
I found that this tool has some of the best team collaborative features – boosting work ethic and reducing miscommunication.
6) Buffer
With Buffer, social media managers can create visually captivating content. Like eclincher, Buffer also incorporates advanced metrics and analytics to help create custom scheduling plans that will enable your posts to reach higher engagement.
7) Hootsuite
Hootsuite is probably one of the tools that offer the most integrations with other apps and websites – I was really amazed by how many platforms offer integration with Hootsuite, this speaks a lot about the credibility of the tool.
Hootsuite allows you to schedule social media posts and manage all your accounts from a single user-friendly dashboard. Additionally, like eclincher, Hootsuite offers security features that help you identify spam and fraud – preventing a scenario where your reputation could be damaged.
8) Sprout Social
Finally, we have Sprout Social, a very easy-to-use social media management platform to promote your business on social media. Like most tools on this list, this tool also supports scheduling, publishing, and analytics for most major social media platforms.
What Does A Social Media Scheduler Tool Do?
By now, you probably already know what a social media scheduler does. A social media scheduler tool has a suite of features to help you manage your social media presence more efficiently. These features include:
- Content scheduling – Plan and schedule your posts in advance – saving you a ton of time.
- Automatic posting – Most social media scheduling tools publish your posts automatically at the set time.
- Content curation – These tools curate content to help you identify trending topics and keywords you can post about to boost user engagement.
- Management – Most scheduler tools have a single dashboard that you can use to manage all your social media accounts.
- Analytics – Track the performance of your posts and use the recommendations and insights obtained from the tool to create content that resonates better with your audience.
These are the most common features a social media scheduling tool has. However, each social media scheduling tool will have different features that make them an attractive option to use for your social media marketing.
Who Uses These Tools?
A wide variety of people use these tools. These people include:
- Individuals who just want to make posting easier
- Influencers
- Businesses
- Organizations
- Freelancers and social media managers
- Marketing teams
- Enterprises
How We Rate Social Media Scheduling Tools
When we rate social media scheduling tools, it is important to us that we first test them as well as keep functionality and practicality into consideration. Therefore we have constructed guidelines we use when rating these tools:
Features – Does the tool offer the necessary features to fit a social media scheduling tool description? How easy are these features to use? What additional features does the tool have to make my job easier? We always love seeing a drag-and-drop calendar, single dashboard, advanced analytics, and content curation on an app.
Accuracy – The features need to be accurate. If not, then it can potentially damage your reputation, and we all know how valuable your name and reputation are.
Price Point – Is the tool priced competitively with the rest of the market? What features does the tool have to justify its price point?
Effectiveness- Will the tool help me reach my goal of ultimately boosting social media ROI? Or will it just schedule social media posts for me?
Practicality and Functionality – Is the tool easy to use, how long does it take for me to learn its navigation, and does the tool offer mobile services?
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best social scheduling tool?
The current best social media scheduler is eclincher. It’s easy to use, very affordable, and it makes managing your social media accounts effortless.
What are scheduling tools for social media?
A social media scheduling tool is a tool or platform that is designed to help you manage your social media presence more efficiently by allowing you to schedule, curate and optimize posts.
How do I automate my IG posts?
By using a social media scheduling tool to help you schedule posts and then automate them to publish at your desired time.
What is the simplest social media scheduler?
The simplest social media scheduler is probably the one the app comes out with. However, if you are looking for the simplest third-party social media scheduler, then eclincher is your best bet.
What is the best time to post on Instagram?
That depends on what your target audience and time zone. Generally, the best time to post is during work hours or shortly after work hours as well as on weekends.
The Bottom Line
Using a social media scheduling tool can be a great way to boost your social media marketing efficiency. With the suite of features these tools use, you can expect to see a massive jump in productivity. However, it is important to use a tool that is easy to learn, provides accurate data, and helps you increase your reputation and credibility, not damage or compromise it.
eclincher is currently the best social media scheduling tool on the market. If you wish to learn more about how this tool can help your business increase its social media ROI, feel free to contact us – trust me, you won’t regret it!