Connor BrookeSocial media is part of our lives, whether you like it or not. As brands set up more and more social media accounts, it can be hard to have a handle across all platforms, especially, if like me, you control all of them, all at once.
The key to being successful lies in the organisation. That’s why you need a platform that allows you to integrate your social media profiles, and send multiple messages all at once, with one click. Enter Hootsuite.
Hootsuite, for those of you that don’t know, is a web based social media management tool. The basic plan is currently free, and gives you straightforward access including: integration with five social media profiles, basic reporting and unlimited apps, including StumbleUpon and Reddit.
The paid version of Hootsuite allows you to include an unlimited amount of social media profiles, add another user, and see advanced reporting, including geo-targeting. At the moment, I’m using the free version of Hootsuite.
Here are my favourite features of Hootsuite:
1. Scheduled messages
One of the most important parts of a marketing strategy is planning. Without planning you have nothing – you’re just stabbing around in the dark and hoping for the best. Hootsuite allows you to plan your social media campaigns in advance.
Using the ‘Publisher’ tool you can schedule tweets, or Facebook posts, or just about anything for a date and time set in the future. This is perfect for saving time, whilst ensuring continuous engagement. An example, if like me, you’re based in the UK, you’re often left waiting for the US to wake up and get going. At the start of your day, schedule tweets for popular times of day when you know they’ll be seen by many people, to encourage engagement. Remember to check back once your tweets have been sent – keep an eye on your replies and engage accordingly.
2. Secure team setup
Social media is often the first place a customer or prospect will look, even before accessing your website. Due to the vast reach that social media can have, it’s important to have the right team. Social media managers should know who is controlling what account and at what time, just in case something goes horribly wrong.
Hootsuite Pro allows you to add users as your teams grow without sharing passwords. This keeps your social media accounts secure. When you are posting content on Hootsuite, you are asked which social media profile you would like to send the message from and this is where trouble occurs. There have been instances of personal tweets being posted from company accounts, like the one below from the Red Cross:
In a brilliant PR move they responded with this tweet:
Hootsuite now allows users to use Secure Profiles, which prompts users to confirm messages before they are sent, potentially preventing a PR nightmare.
3. Track campaigns
Hootsuite’s dashboard will allow you to manage day to day user engagement, but you can also use it to learn more about your industry or your competitors.
You can set up streams for the type of content you want to monitor, for example, set your Twitter home feed and additional streams for mentions, direct messages or your lists. As an email marketing company, we have streams set up for the keywords ‘email marketing’ and ‘social media marketing’ to keep an eye on our industry, or any potential clients.
You could also set up a stream with your company name, to see who is mentioning you and where, even if they don’t directly mention you in the message.
4. Easily measure success
Hootsuite Pro allows you to create fantastic analytical reports. This is perfect for those who are looking to show how well social media builds engagement and brand reputations. It’s also useful for those wanting to track the effectiveness of a social media campaign – you will be able to see your reach and impact easily.
Measurable items include follower growth and mentions on Twitter. Facebook and Google analytics data can also be integrated, allowing you to see how many users visited your website based on the links you posted on your social media profiles.
Even if you are using the free version, you will still be able to view important analytics such as most popular links, clicks by region and top referrals. The free analytics may not be as good as the paid version (obviously) but it still helps brands understand the success of their posts and where traffic is coming from.
5. Get help
Hootsuite was created by an agency to easily manage their social media needs, and is directly aimed at marketing teams and organisations, according to Hootsuite’s managing director Dave Olson. This means the team behind Hootsuite are looking to continually improve and are willing to help.
Hootsuite has a blog and a help desk for users to access if they’re having trouble. The blog and helpdesk also features how-tos, best practices and allows you to submit your own feedback. The custom analytics tool was created because users asked for it.
6. Ow.ly links
As you can see Hootsuite’s logo is an owl, and because of this their shortened links are reduced to ow.ly. I love this uniformity between the owl logo and the link name – it’s a perfect example of brand consistency.
Downsides of Hootsuite
There aren’t many, but here are my main pet peeves with Hootsuite:
- Price plan
I understand that companies have to make money somewhere, but I wish more analytics were available on the free version of the platform. The Pro version price plan starts at around £7 per month, and does come with a 30 day free trial. It includes additional analytics, unlimited apps and unlimited RSS feeds. It does seem to be a bargain, but I’ll stick with the free version for now.
- Lack of new social media sites
Part of me wishes that sites like Pinterest and Instagram were part of Hootsuite’s integration. Although Hootsuite helps control all social media channels easily, without this integration, you need a few additional tabs open on your desktop to monitor the behaviour on these sites. Hopefully new social media sites will be added to Hootsuite in the future.
- Poor mobile app
The Hootsuite mobile app is currently being worked on. Last week Hootsuite removed their version 1.0 API which has caused issues with the app. They are working on a newly revamped HTML 5 version of their app, which will work on most iOS, Android, Blackberry and Window devices.
Other types of social media management tools
If you’re interested in using a social media management tool, but think Hootsuite isn’t for you, take a look at these other platforms:
– Buffer
Buffer allows you to schedule content across social media and provides analytics about the reach of your posts. You can integrate Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
– SocialOomph
SocialOomph again allows you to schedule tweets, track keywords and view mentions. SocialOomph also allows you to automatically auto-follow new followers, if you want to save time by reciprocating follows.
– SocialFlow
SocialFlow will show you real time conversations on your social media. It enables you to find the right time for posting content based on audience behaviour.
This article was written for Business 2 Community by Connor Brooke.
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Nicely written Amy! This is a pretty awesome outline of all the HootSuite bells and whistles – thanks for sharing the HootSuite story!
Hoot on,
Connor from HootSuite
Hi Connor! Apologies for the late reply – only just seen this. Thanks :)