Communicating with your audience is simple enough when it comes to Facebook. We head to our page or profile, create a status or post a story and voila.
But, if you’re looking to engage your audience all week, even on the days when you’re away from your PC and busy doing other things, then scheduling may be for you.
Scheduling posts on social media has various benefits. It allows you to re-engage your audience, appear active and thought-leading on trending topics, and promote your brand even when you’re away from the business!
In this blog, we break down how to schedule posts on Facebook, so that you can continue engaging and communicating with your audience successfully.
First, you have to plan your content.
Planning content is extremily vital and will determine the outcome of the campaign.
What content do you want to share with your audience? Is it a promotional post that sells your products/services? Is it a generic, chatty post with intentions of gaining likes and comments? Or, is it something else you’d like to communicate?
Once you’ve decided on what content you’re going to post, consider the different social media channels – will a blog post do better on LinkedIn rather than Instagram for example, and so on.
Next, think about the resources you’re going to use and the impact on budget. Will you use Canva, the free online design tool, or pay for Photoshop and have staff train or spend time creating original content?
Once you’ve considered these aspects of the campaign and ran over SMART objectives, you’re ready to continue.
Secondly, it’d be great to check the numbers.
Analysing data is another important factor when it comes to posting on social media – and we still need to do this even when we’re scheduling.
It’s important to recognise when content performed well on social media in the past; i.e. what time, what type of content is was and on what day.
By using this information, you can begin to decide when the best time to schedule your posts is for maximum performance and increased engagement!
For example, Fridays at 12pm may be your best performing day in terms of likes, comments, shares and click-throughs. Therefore, it’d be wise to market your new product announcement, start a competition, or post a blog at this time.
By taking what has been learnt in the past and putting it into practice for future social media marketing campaigns, you can capitalise on your success and grow the company, essentially meeting the aims and objectives of the company.
Next, it’s time to use the scheduling tool
The scheduling tool, Creator Studio, provided by Facebook business management is the tool brands should use to schedule content.
Creator Studio is pretty straightforward to use.
You’ll need to visit Facebook, and then head to Creator Studio. Then, click to create your post.
Input all the fields
Whether you’re uploading a video to Facebook, an image, or inserting a link (get the preview quicker using Facebook’s handy URL Debugger), Creator Studio makes it easy to Post.
Scheduling…
Click the schedule button to be brought on to the next stage of scheduling a post on Facebook…
Big Tip: Check analytics
To determine when to post your content, check past posts and their performance. By understanding which days and times improve post performance, you can use this for future scheduling!
And voila!
There you have it – each step to scheduling content on Facebook, so that as a brand you can appear more present (even when you’re away from the computer!)
