4 Ways to the Use Content Publishing Tool BufferApp

Ever since I attended Blog World in Los Angeles this past November, I have been obsessed with this amazing content publishing tool called BufferApp. In case you aren’t familiar, let me give you the rundown:

BufferApp is a tool where you can quickly put interesting articles, blog posts, or tweets/updates for your Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, or LinkedIn profiles into a buffer. Basically, if I see an interesting article that I think my followers would enjoy, I put it into my buffer, where I can edit the tweet or update before it goes out. For an example, see the picture below.

There are a variety of plans available, with different benefits of how many social media accounts you can manage using BufferApp, bit.ly link details, advanced scheduling, browser extensions, and how many updates you can place in your buffer. Even better, you can select how many updates you would like to go out from BufferApp each day, whether it be Monday through Friday or the whole week, as well as what times you’d like them to go out.

Time saving tip: Once you have signed up for BufferApp, make sure to download the extension for whatever browser(s) you use the most. I absolutely love the Chrome extension. All I have to do is click the BufferApp button, then a popup window shows up (just like the picture shown above) where I can edit my content and choose which social networks I’d like to share the article with.

How to Use the Content Publishing Tool

But the important part is how you actually use the content publishing tool. Here are a couple tips to get your started:

1. Buy the Pro account (or upgrade to the Enterprise account!).

Whether you’re a small business or a large corporation, you need to at least get Pro account to be able to use the tool to your advantage, while saving yourself time. The Pro account lets you have up to 50 updates in your buffer for each social media account you are managing (up to 6 accounts), allows for advanced scheduling, and gives access to 2 team members for each account.

First of all, the Pro account is affordable: it’s only $10 a month, which you can pay for a year upfront or on a monthly schedule. Second of all, social media is all about frequency these days; it’s important to update your accounts on a daily basis. That means that you can fill you buffer for the next couple days, with maybe even a few tweets to spare. All you need to stay on top of is managing the responses to your updates, which can be easily done with the BufferApp dashboard (see image to the right). Finally, by filling your buffer, you are ultimately updating your social media accounts more. This means, you are potentially reaching more people with comments, share, retweets, etc. In a recent study, one avid user of BufferApp increased his Facebook engagement by 200%!

2. Add a personal snippet to your updates.

The other great thing about BufferApp is that you can edit your updates before they go out. Use this opportunity to engage your followers! Ask them a pertinent question to the article you’re sharing, or share a quote that was part of the blog post. With RSS feeds that are pushed to your social media accounts, you don’t have this opportunity. People are following you because they want to learn about your personality – not just have resources fed to them.

3. Tailor your messages for specific social media networks.

One of the great things about BufferApp is that you can schedule updates for Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. While this is a great thing in itself, I still encourage you to tailor your messages for each social network. This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t share one resource on more than one social network – you definitely should (if appropriate). But make sure the messages is suited for the audience. For example, you can create longer status updates with Facebook and LinkedIn as opposed to Twitter. Take this opportunity to say more than you could in a tweet, while not being too wordy.

The reason why I say this is because people who follow you on more than one social network will find value in this. Say you find an article about Pinterest: on Facebook, you could share a takeaway from the article and ask what people think about it; on Twitter, you could ask which of your followers are using Pinterest and why; and on LinkedIn, you could add a takeaway, while asking your connections how they are using Pinterest to expand their business.

4. Add a BufferApp button to your sharing buttons.

While other BufferApp users might be using the extensions, it is always appreciated to have the BufferApp button in your sharing buttons so that people can easily place your content into their buffers. BufferApp actually developed a great social sharing plugin for WordPress called Digg Digg, which easily lets you choose which social sharing buttons you’d like in your sidebar (look to the left to see mine!). If you make it easy for people to share your content, then why wouldn’t people want to share it? Having this button in your social sharing toolbar effectively makes your content more shareable.

If you aren’t convinced yet, then go and check out the site for yourself. I’ve been using BufferApp for months and couldn’t be happier with the content publishing tool!

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Jenn

Marketing Consultant at DK New Media

Jenn Lisak is a Marketing Consultant and Client Advocate for DK New Media, an inbound marketing agency that specializes in new media optimization, social media, infographics, and marketing strategy. She is responsible for content and infographic development, social media strategy, and managing and advocating for her clients. She writes and speaks on content marketing, infographics, and social media, and she was nominated for Junior Achievement’s Best and Brightest Award for the Technology division in 2012.