How social media auto-tools can be unsocial

Planning social media posts can save you time and energy if you are posting on multiple platforms, regardless of how large your brand is. Be wary of getting too comfortable with tools like Hootsuite, Tweetdeck and Buffer though. There may be times when it’s hurtful and not helpful.

Here are some examples of such cases:

1. All your content is the same.
If you are posting on many different platforms, you should be rewriting your content in different formants. While your message might be the same, users of different platforms don’t always respond to content if it’s written poorly. One of the biggest rule breakers is the use of the hashtag (#) on platforms like LinkedIn and sometimes Facebook (although Facebook sees the importance of using the hashtag and is slowly but surely becoming a more hashtag friendly site). A hashtag is used primarily on twitter (but is friendly for Instagram and Pinterest as well) and is used to sort tweets in different categories. The hashtag doesn’t work on sites like LinkedIn and looks ugly on your posts. The best thing to do is write two different posts, one that is hashtag friendly and one that isn’t and post it to it’s respected social media platform.

2. It can make your brand look lazy
Relying solely on automation tools to post your content can make you and your business seem lazy. This is most important when a piece of news or information goes viral. If you are only using automation tools to post, but you aren’t monitoring what’s happening on your Facebook wall you may loose out on a split second marketing opportunity to get people to notice your business (Pharrell’s hat and Arby’s comes to mind).

3. It can alienate you from your audience.
It may seem obvious, but the key to social media is being social. Your audience wants to hear from you. They notice when you send them a quick response to their Tweet or Facebook post. It makes them feel like their voice is important and shows your business values customer service.

Monitoring what others post is key to social media success. It’s important to know and interact with your audience because they should dictate what type of content your business shares. There are certainly a lot positive aspects to using automation tools as well. Most of them are easy to use and make it easy to organize your social media calendar. These tools can make your content consistent and if timed at the right moment, can give your business an amazing reach. Just remember to use them correctly and always remember to not rely on these tools to build your brand (it’s up to you).