If you’ve ever tried to manage multiple social media profiles on multiple platforms, you know how quickly it can overwhelm your day. You could outsource to a marketing company, or hire a teenaged intern. But what if there was a way you could more easily maintain your profiles without spending a lot of money. That’s where a good Social Media Management Tool comes in.

There are lots to choose from, but I’ve had great success with Hootsuite. Not only does it have a great feature set and integrate with many platforms, but it has a great free option. In the free option you are limited to 3 platforms and can only schedule ahead 30 posts. The paid models include expanded limitations there as well as additional features.

Why to use a Social Media Management Tool

1. Schedule ahead. No longer will you scramble to remember to post certain message on certain days. You can set up your Veteran’s Day post months in advance and schedule it to go live at the appropriate day and hour. Just be careful if you schedule too far out in advance that there aren’t any sudden current events that could make the context of your post seem inappropriate.
2. Create an editorial calendar. Similar to scheduling ahead you can plan ahead. Instead of social media being a daily chore, you and your team can meet once a month and plan out the editorial calendar in a few hours. That makes it seem much more manageable when you’re sticking to a plan versus hunting for fresh content constantly.
3. Easily collaborate. If you share the social media task with one or more people, you might accidentally post at the same time or duplicate messages. Scheduling ahead will let your collaborators see what messages are planned for the week and maybe they can opt to fill in gaps in the schedule, or ask you to move your post to another day.
4. Cross-post your message. While I’ve advocated against straight cross-posting, it is still easier to hit multiple sites from a consolidated user interface. You can copy and paste your message onto Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram all from the same screen and that’s easier that remembering 3 logins and going to 3 different sites.

If you could use a boost to your productivity, or find social media to be a necessary burden, give a Social Media Management Tool a try!