HootSuite is one of my favorite tools for scheduling my social media posts. I both schedule and share my blogs posts and others using it. The awesome thing about it is that it not only has a dashboard to work from, but an app and extension for the browser. I use Chrome, however I’m most certain they offer one for Safari, Foxfire, and IE. Another awesome thing about Hootsuite is that its free to use, although they do offer an upgradeable Pro version with even more cool features than the regular version.
Scheduling your posts is so easy and fast, that you’ll wonder why you weren’t doing it sooner. Plus, by being able to schedule posts on so many platforms of social media at once will save you tons of time.
So here’s how to do it:
1. Download the app, browser extension, or go to Hootsuite.com and sign up. You can sign up using your current social media accounts, such as Facebook and Twitter. This is what I did and it makes it so easy for signing in. Also, for the purpose of this tutorial, I will be showing how to schedule posts via the browser extension. However, once you become familiar with Hootsuite, you will see that there are several ways to schedule posts from the dashboard and from the app on your phone. They all work pretty similar though.
As you can see, I have the extension installed and it appears right next to my menu bar.
2. Add your Social Media Accounts and set up your streams.
3. Once you complete step 2, you’re pretty much set to go and ready to start scheduling. All you have to do is compose a message, hit the browser extension or right click on whatever page you are wanting to share to schedule the post. Click “Share via Hootsuite”.
4. A dialog box will open that will allow you to share the post instantly or schedule it for a later time.
As you can see, a preview will automatically be generated with a thumbnail of the post you are sharing. You can choose to AutoSchedule your post or manually schedule it. If choose to AutoSchedule, Hootsuite will use its algorithms to schedule it a peak times for whatever social media account your are sharing to. This is a good option if you are sharing other people’s posts. I love this option, because it does all the work for me.
For manually scheduling posts, you simply click the calendar in between AutoSchedule and Send Now, pick a time and date, and bam, you are now able go forth and do great things.
Note that depending on the platform, the thumbnail preview may or may not be available. I mostly post to Facebook and Twitter, and the thumbnail preview is available, however you do have the option to remove it. You can do this by hitting the “X” and it will remove it from the post. If you have the Pro version you can add many more accounts, schedule even more posts, and view more in depth stats, so you can see how many people engaged you on a particular post.
And that’s it! Just four easy tips for scheduling posts and making your precious time online that much more efficient.
You can check out more tips here!
*Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.
xxoo,
This s great! Never heard of this app, but will definitely be looking into I!! Thank y!
You’re every welcome! It’s awesome!
I first learned about Hootsuite a few years ago and it’s one of the best tools/tips for blogging! I wish I could tell you I used it a lot but I mostly am doing everything in real time. I’m sure with crazy summer plans, I’ll be using it more.
Yes! I know exactly what you mean. I actually use Hootsuite in real time mostly, because I can view all my steams from it, instead of having to login into each site separately. It’s great for that!
LOVE HootSuite! I use it to promote on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. It’s such a time saver. I’ve never tried using the browser extension though – thanks for the tip! I’ll have to check it out. I also have never auto scheduled anything. Are you happy with the times it picks for your posts?
It’s really is! That’s one of the biggest reasons I use Hootsuite. The browser extension is my fave, right up there’s with the app. So far with the times, I’ve likes the times it’s picked. I haven’t seen any that were overly random. I think it does a pretty good job with them.
I have used hootsuite before and it is such an amazing tool! I used it when I first started blogging when I had some health products I was selling on my blog. I will definitely share this. I’m sure someone could definitely use this tool for sure!
Absolutely! Thanks so much for sharing hun! The one thing I really like about Hootsuite is the phone app. It’s so intuitive and easier than the actual website. So even if you just want to use it to be able to view multiple streams, it’s great for that too.
I’ve always been wary of automatic tweets, because I didn’t think Google liked them. But if it lets me have more time to read other blogs, and less time promoting my own posts, I’m in favor of it! I’ll give it a shot.
You definitely have point there, but I’m not a SEO guru, so I couldn’t tell you. I will say that I can imagine Google frowns more upon automatic bots scheduling posts, versus an actual person. Plus, Hootsuite can be used for so much more than a scheduling posts. You also have to do all of the leg work yourself, Hootsuite won’t automatically schedule a post without you telling it to. It’s definitely worth a shot!
This is so helpful! Thank you so much for sharing! I’ve been blogging for a few years, but I am now starting to be serious about it. This is definitely going to help!
Alex @ Lavender’s Blue
I’m pretty new to social media. I’ve always done my sharing the old fashioned way, but I can see how this would save lots of time. I’m going to pin this for future reference. Thanks!
Thanks for the tips. I’ve been meaning to try this for a while. The time saving factor you talked about is convincing me to just do it. : )
You’re very welcome! It really is a big time saver. I don’t know what I’d so without it!
I like Hootesuite too, when I’m organized but more often then not, I’m promoting on the fly!
I’m right there with you! I do have to be in an organized mom set to use it!
I’ve been wondering about hootsuite! I need something to simplify and help me out with the social networking, and I think this may just be the right fit! Thanks!
You’re so welcome! I can’t tell you how much it’s helped me!
I cannot tell you how happy I am to find your Hootsuite tutorial. I recently went back to working full time and I downloaded the app but haven’t made the time to learn how to use it yet. I’m pinning so I can refer back to this tomorrow and see what I’ve been missing. Thank you!
You’re very welcome! I’m so glad you found it useful. It’s totally worth learning the app, because it will save you a good bit of time in the future!
Here from Show Stopper Saturdays – I just found HootSuite and love it! Thanks for this detailed tutorial!
Thanks so much for stopping by! I’m glad you like the tutorial!
I used to use HootSuite, it’s a nice program! 🙂
Thanks for joining the Link Up this week!
Yeah, it totally is! My fave thing about it is the browser extension.
What do you use, if anything, for Pinterest? I don’t have a business G+ account/page, so I have never used it for G+. However, I use it for Facebook and Twitter.
I actually just pin to Pinterest in real time. There are apps/programs out there for scheduling content to Pinterest, but I don’t utilize any of them. Hootsuite really is great for Twitter and Facebook. Maybe in the future they will integrate Pinterest.