I took the plunge into managing my social media efforts on a more professional level by joining HootSuite. I’ve had reservations about using a service like HootSuite in the past. After doing a little research, and playing around with various apps, I’m sure I will use this web service because it will save me time.
It took me about an hour to get my accounts set up and to run through the basic information about HootSuite. There were a couple of videos online that really helped jumpstart the process for me. They cover a couple of key time savers for me – the ability to share / schedule posts from my RSS feeds as well as other people’s content from around the web.
- Syndication with HootSuite – From Lynda.com
- Hootlet with AutoSchedule – From the HootSuite video archive
My reservations about using a service to manage my social media were mostly about the value of the service. I was not sure what application best fit my use case – especially because social media is a new industry and changing quickly. After doing a little research online it was clear that HootSuite is going to be around for a while and that it’s price point is very reasonable – the perfect choice for someone like me who want to save time and can spend around $100 a year for the service.
HootSuite allows you to add in 3rd party apps – similar to how WordPress has 3rd party themes – that expand on their somewhat limited social network list. Currently they include Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Foursquare, WordPress, and Mixi. The unexpected app I was surpassed and happy to find today is called vidIQ. It takes the information from YouTube and provides insights in a nice format. The other cool feature is that it automatically creates a video page for Facebook. All in all after a day of exploration I am really glad I took the leap and got on board with HootSuite.
Automatically generated video page from vidIQ
