The BEST Social Media Planner Out There
Without a doubt, social media marketing has become the fastest, most effective way of marketing your small business with anyone under the age of 35…
(and a lot of people above that age because - newsflash - technology isn’t going anywhere, people). We’re now in an age where cohesive Instagram feeds, ~relevant~ terminology, and your coolness factor are the best way to be remembered by your followers.
For me, that would be @carlyjeanlosangeles + @golivehq. Just go to their Instagram feeds and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
When it comes to small businesses, more often than not, whoever is running the social media accounts is also juggling a million other things. So, it’s hard to stop what you’re doing to spend half an hour posting things to your Instagram feed to tell your followers, Hey, we’re still here. Please don’t forget us.
There are countless social media calendar/scheduling apps out there. Some of the ones you have probably heard of are Buffer, Hootsuite, and Loomly. We’ve used of few of those in the office ourselves. They did their job of doing what they’re meant to do - scheduling social media posts. It just always seemed like there had to have been something better out there. Something that could do more.
Good news. THERE IS.
Planoly.
We came across this a few months ago. It is your social media planner on steroids. Not only does it let you plan your posts - AND Instagram stories! - in advance, but it also shows you how your feed will look after the fact. (Remember how I said a cohesive Instagram feed is the new thing?)
Here’s how Planoly makes your life easier:
Scheduling
Much like Buffer & Hootsuite, Planoly offers social media scheduling. Essentially, you will create posts weeks (sometimes months) in advance, upload them into Planoly, and choose the date & time you want to post. You are able to choose “auto post” OR post manually. If you choose the latter, Planoly will remind you to post on the day and time you choose. About 3 clicks on your phone later, your post will be live on your feed. It is too easy & too good to be true. But I promise it is!
Visual Planning
You can see how your feed will look before you post. No more posting & deleting because the color is off from the rest of your feed (are we the only people who do that? Whoops.). You can even rearrange your posts to see which picture looks best where. If we’re being honest, this is the reason we chose to give this new platform a chance. Everything else that it offers is the reason we fell in love.
Analyzing Your Posts
The home screen when you login to your Planoly account is a calendar. Not only can you see posts coming up that you’ve scheduled, but you can also see how your previous posts (that have already been posted) are faring. How many likes did they get? Comments? What time did you post? What day?
All of this information can tell you what type of posts your followers like. You can also narrow down things like the best time and day of the week to post. All of this is important when containing and growing your follower base.
Sharing With Your Co-Workers
Planoly offers a “Plan Report” that you can share with your boss or co workers before you post. It’s a simple as copying a link & sending it in an email. Like I’ve mentioned before, employees of small businesses wear many hats. If you want to run your next few posts by your co-workers/higher up, simply click the “Report” button & Planoly creates a link that shares the images you’re posting along with the caption & schedule.
Have we convinced you yet? Check out Planoly here!
Do you have something that you think can top it? We’d love to hear in the comment section below!