Hughes blog post: Automating social media – time-saving move or time to re-think?

Did you know there are some incredible tools available designed to make managing your social media accounts easier?

You can automatically sync your Facebook updates to Twitter, or you can automatically sync your Twitter updates to Facebook. With a click of a button you can share your Instagram photos on Twitter, or use a tool to share your Twitter updates on LinkedIn.

All of these tools are created to save you time – if you post something on one platform, and it automatically goes to another, then you’re essentially halving the effort required to communicate with your two audiences.

But: if you want my advice…? Don’t do it.

Here’s the thing. Social media communication takes effort. Effort trumps all: it doesn’t matter how good your content is, or how loved your brand is, if you don’t put in the effort – you won’t effectively communicate with your online audiences.

By automating your social media communication, such as syncing one platform to another, you’re essentially saying to your audience, “you are an afterthought”.

It shows your audience that you can’t be bothered customising your message to the social media platform they are using. That customisation may mean altering your language, altering your images, or altering your use of things like hashtags.

By taking the extra time to create customised messages for each social media platform you use to communicate, you are ensuring your message is optimised for the users’ experience and therefore will be communicated more effectively.

Here are some tools and articles providing further information to assist you to create customised content for your social media platforms:

• Spout Social’s Always Up-to-Date Guide to Social Media Image Sizes
• Promoting Videos on a Facebook Page: YouTube vs. Native
• Don’t share your Instagram photos to Twitter – do this instead

- Kate Potter