How to Manage Multiple Social Media Accounts using Hootsuite
If you operate your business in the digital world, then you are most likely more than aware of the importance of a good business presence on social media. Platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram have millions upon millions of users each day, and it’s vital that businesses are connecting with existing and potential clients on them.
Depending on the type of business that you operate, you may need to be working with multiple social media platforms, and that’s where a lot of businesses struggle. After all, who has the time to update pages on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter each day? This is where social media management platforms come into play.
Managing the Social Media for your business
When you have multiple accounts to manage on various social media platforms, trying to do it all manually is going to require a huge amount of time and a lot of effort. Updating a single Facebook business page is fine, but if you have to update multiple pages, as well as accounts on other platforms, then the task soon starts becoming tricky.
Fortunately, there is a solution – the use of a social media management system. These are online platforms that have been developed to help you better manage a large number of social media accounts all from one single dashboard.
These can be used to post to multiple social media pages at the same time, as well as to schedule posts for future dates. This means that you can prepare a weeks or even a months’ worth of social media content, and schedule it to be posted automatically on a daily basis, rather than manually doing it each day.
Introducing Hootsuite
One of the most popular and powerful social media management platforms is Hootsuite. It has been operating for over 10 years and during that time has made it possible for individuals or company teams to manage huge amounts of social media accounts.
There are a number of different plans available for everyone, so you can go with the option that is best suited to the number of social media accounts you need to manage.
Of course, the lower priced packages are going to have a few limitations compared with the top of the range options, and even though there are some features in Hootsuite that don’t allow you to collaborate with a team member, there are others that do, so you can always find a way of managing the accounts in an effective and simple way.
Hootsuite can allow you to connect social media accounts from the most popular platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn and YouTube. Their professional account allows you to connect up to 10 social media profiles, which can include a range of different platforms, or multiple accounts from the same platform, such as various Facebook pages that you manage.
For more small businesses, the professional package should be sufficient, but for larger companies where there are teams and more than a single individual managing the social media, then you would be best off going for their Team account which allows up to three individual users and up to 20 social media accounts.
Using Hootsuite
At first glance, Hootsuite might look a little confusing, but it’s pretty straightforward to use, and once you’ve been working with it for a week or two, you’ll have a full understanding of how it all works. Once you’ve added your initial social media accounts and connected them with Hootsuite, you can start posting right away.
You can select whether you want a post to be sent to a single social media platform, or a combination. For example, maybe you want to post an image of a new product you are offering, and want this only to be posted on your Instagram and Pinterest accounts. This can be done very quickly and easily.
You can also start scheduling posts for your social media accounts that can be posted in the future. The publisher and planner sections allow you to pick specific dates and times when you would like to have your post sent to your selected social media pages.
Some final thoughts
Running multiple social media accounts can be a difficult and tiresome task, but with an account manager platform such as Hootsuite, it becomes a breeze.
Social media should play an important role in the marketing strategy of all businesses, and if you are not effectively using it, you could be losing out on connecting with a huge number of potential clients, as well as keeping a positive stream of communication going with your existing customers.
