Managing several social accounts can be very time consuming, luckily there are many free & paid social media management tools out there that can help streamline your social activities, and make you more efficient when it comes to multi-management.
I am often asked which tools I use and find the most useful. Here are my
Top 5 Social Tools + a few honourable mentions...
Bitly
Bitly is a URL shorter which allows you to effectively share and track your links. It tracks clicks, geographic location, and referrers; all important in understanding what your audience is looking for, where they are, and how they are finding you. What's great about this tool is that it is free.
Hootsuite
HootSuite is a Social Media Dashboard. It allows you to manage multiple social networks from one central website. The free version also allows you to shorten and track links, but statistics are limited to only 30 days, which is why I choose to use bitly.
MailChimp
MailChimp is an email delivery platform which allows you to create eye-catching email campaigns, manage your email lists automatically, and dive deep into your delivery analytics. Very easy to use, you can create campaigns with everything from an
RSS feed from your blog, to your most recent posts
Pinterest pins. Best of all the basic level account is free.
Wordpress
A website is the central hub. All social media platforms below should be well integrated into the website for seamless sharing and engagement. A platform like Wordpress allows you to integrate your website and blog, and has an easy to use Content Management System. To get the most of our Wordpress, I like to use the self-hosted option. Netfirms.com make it easy to implement with their 1-click-install option.
Google Reader
Google Reader is an RSS feed reader which allows you to follow all of your favourite business and personal blogs all in one place. It is also easy to add Google Alerts to track company & product mentions, and other keyword mentions from new sources, and blog sources. Best of all, it is free.
Honourable Mentions:
AddThis.com
Addthis.com is a sharing applet that can be installed on any website and blog. Signing up for a free account allows you to track what pages on your website are being shared, how many times, and on what social platforms.
Google Analytics
Google Analytics is a free web analytics solution that gives you insights into website traffic and marketing effectiveness. It tracks how many people visit your site, how many pages they looked at, how long they spent on your site, how they found it (keywords), who is linking to you, where in the world are your visitors coming from, plus hundreds more metrics.
Twitter Plugin for your Website
This twitter widget allows you to display your most recent tweets in the sidebar of your website in real-time. It also allows your visitors to easily find your twitter profile and follow you.
Facebook Plugin for your Website
This facebook badge allows you to display your most “likes” and profile in the sidebar of your website. It also allows your visitors to easily find your facebook profile and makes it easy for them to “like” you.
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What are some of your favourite social tools?
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