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According to research done by Digg, in one minute, there are about 1 million Facebook users logged in and 87,5000 people tweeting. There are also 3.8 million queries on Google, 347,222 people on Instagram, and about 188 million emails sent.

These statistics show how hard it can get for your business to keep abreast of customers’ needs on social media. You must be available for every mention and every question on all of the social media platforms your customers frequent.

Speed is important to today’s buyers. They start losing their patience with you after 10 minutes.

image: HubSpotThese statistics show how important it is to have social media automation. This involves automating all of the tedious tasks of operating multiple social media accounts to ensure your audience remains engaged, and you get up-to-date mentions across all platforms.

Why You Need Social Media Automation

There are so many social media channels you can use today to put your brand in front of your ideal customers. However, you need a social media presence that targets the right audience with consistent interactions to promote your brand right.

Social media automation makes this possible.

As a social media marketer, you need to have a social media strategy to help you plan and post content. Social media automation helps you plan and schedule content so you can publish it at the right times.

Some other benefits of automating your social media marketing campaigns include:

1. Save Time

Ever felt like there’s not enough time in a day to handle all of your social media accounts? Scheduling posts, replying to mentions, and maintaining an active presence on all platforms can be overwhelming.

Automation allows you to manage all of your accounts from one location. You can respond to requests, customer service issues, comments, @replies, and questions on time, without having to login to different platforms manually.

Some automation tools help you find trending topics and discover content that resonates with your target audience.

With more time, you can ensure the right content and messaging on each platform. You will also have more time to craft appropriate images, especially if the automation app has image editing capabilities.

Automation also gives you time to A/B test your marketing campaigns. You will be able to find out what content or message is working best, and support your findings with real data.

Social media automation also gives you time to check on marketing campaign reports and analysis. Insights you get help you identify areas to improve in the future campaigns. They can also show you what effect your current efforts have on your target audience.

2. Be Consistent

Consistency is essential in social media marketing. Your message and how you deliver it should be consistent. You may feel like a robot repeating the same message and using the same language, but this is a big part of branding.

Delivering content predictably and effectively grows your follower base. If your audience knows when you will post next, and they will look forward to reading it.

Automating allows you to have publishing schedules across multiple platforms. 83% of marketers say social media post scheduling is the most suitable use of marketing automation.

3. Increase Visibility

Automation helps you create a working social media strategy. It ensures your messages are visible to the audience and helps you reach them on time.

Social media automation works for you 24/7 so that you are always available to customers. You can stay in touch with your audience when they are active.

You have complete control over content shared, times of posting, and frequency. Automation tools allow you to schedule posts after creating them. They then publish at the times of your choosing. They also make it easy for you to post your content on different platforms frequently.

Since automation tools provide you with insights on how your content is performing, it becomes easier to reach your target customers.

Tools to Use When Automating Your Social Media Marketing Campaigns

Today’s competitive market demands that businesses produce the best content, establish brand presence, drive traffic, and increase credibility.

Social media automation allows marketers to produce content that stands out and places them above the fold.

Some of the tools you can use for your social media automation marketing campaigns include:

1. Cortex

image: Meetcortex
Cortex offers an AI editor that analyzes the content you create and provides suggestions for post enhancement. It has optimization features including hashtags, keywords, images, and videos to use with your copy.

It also analyzes the posts and content from your competitors to ensure that your content stands out. You also get insights into how your competitors’ posts are performing for comparison purposes.

Cortex even provides you with recommendations on the content that will work best on any social media platform you use.

2. Hootsuite

image: Hootsuite
Hootsuite is a social media automation tool with numerous features that can help boost your social media marketing campaigns.

With Hootsuite you can:

• Keep track of all social media channels from one location.
• Monitor and get real-time updates. It keeps you updated on what people are saying about your brand online. This feature comes in handy when averting or dealing with a crisis.
• Receive regular analytics to help you determine the best times to post content.
• Get advanced analytics to generate in-depth reports.
• Delegate assignments to team members and approve workflows.
• Manage your social media customer service effectively.
• Find influencers for your brand.
• Use the social media security feature to protect your brand.

3. AgoraPulse

image: Agorapulse
AgoraPulse is a comprehensive solution for your social media automation needs. It allows you to:

• Understand the type of content that resonates with your audience.
• Plan and schedule content across different platforms so that it stays on-brand across channels.
• Collaborate easily with teams.
• Set up a recurring republishing content schedule based on categories.
• Engage with customers and prospects from one place.
• Use the smart analytics feature to track performance and conversions.

Conclusion

Social media automation is a substantial aspect of marketing that businesses cannot afford to overlook. It helps your brand stand out from competitors and simplifies your business operations in many ways. It can:

• Free up your time so that you can concentrate on being productive.
• Help you manage all of your social media accounts from one platform.
• Allow you to publish content at the right time for maximum exposure.
• Help you increase engagement with customers, which improves brand credibility. You can like, comment on, and engage with customers’ posts immediately.
• Boost your online presence and increase brand awareness through consistent publishing.
• Widen your reach by helping you reach customers 24/7.
• Help you post quality content on trending topics.
• Allow you to reuse content from time to time with a fresh look.
• Provide data reports and analytics to help your team improve your social media marketing strategy.
• Keep you organized by gathering and laying out your campaigns and projects in one place. This feature makes it easier to handle campaigns and collaborate with team members.

Automating your social media marketing efforts will help you run campaigns accurately and reduce your workload.

What social media automation tools do you use? Please share them with us in the comment section.

Image: Depositphotos.com

This article, “3 Reasons You Need to Automate Your Social Media Marketing Campaigns” was first published on Small Business Trends