16 top social media scheduling tools to save time

What is a social media scheduling tool?

A social media scheduling tool is a software or tool that helps you schedule your social posts across multiple social media accounts and platforms. Just because social media is an “always on,” it doesn’t mean you have to be.

Scheduling your social posts ahead of time gives you and your social team the opportunity to plan ahead and stay focused with other tasks.

These 16 social media scheduling tools can boost your marketing workflow

1. Sprout Social
2. CoSchedule
3. Feedly
4. Airtable
5. Tweetdeck
6. Planable
7. Sked Social
8. Post Planner
9. StatusBrew
10. MeetEdgar
11. eClincher
12. NapoleonCat
13. Sendible
14. SocialBee
15. Zoho Social
16. Iconosquare

1. Sprout Social

Sprout Social is your best bet if you're looking for a social media scheduling tool that does it all. 

Sprout customers - from small businesses to enterprise companies to agencies - rave about the ability to effortlessly plan, organize and deliver content and campaigns across social networks.

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For starters, jumping back and forth between networks is a huge time-sink. Consider how the bulk of brands out there are publishing content to multiple social platforms. With Sprout, you can publish your latest Facebook post, Instagram photo or Tweet simultaneously.

In addition to its industry-leading scheduling tools, interactive calendar and asset management library, Sprout also simplifies collaboration. User-level permissions provide specific access to marketing managers, writers and everyone in between to contribute to your publishing strategy.

And once your content is scheduled and published, Sprout makes it easy to measure success and refine your game plan going forward.

You can easily apply custom tags to messages to better organize and report, then use Sprout’s easy-to-use social media analytics to evaluate impressions, engagement, follower growth and much more.

From analyzing hashtags to identifying top-performing content, Sprout represents the ultimate optimization tool for brands looking to fine-tune their social presence in addition to scheduling content. You can even count on Sprout for social ad reporting to boost ROI from the paid content you’re scheduling.

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While Sprout gives you ultimate control to plan your publishing strategy as you see fit, it also makes it easy to automate the process to maximize results.

Sprout’s patented ViralPost® technology helps you hone in on the optimal posting times for your audience, replacing guesswork with guaranteed engagement.

2. CoSchedule

CoSchedule emphasizes efficiency for marketing teams and individuals alike. Integrating with company blogs via WordPress, the platform allows brands to publish and push content to social media simultaneously.

Additionally, CoSchedule provides a comprehensive "Top Content Report" which documents social shares and engagement. This is a fantastic feature for content creators looking to figure out which pieces are resonating most with readers. You can also attach items from Google Drive, your computer library and Coschedule’s headline studio.

Unlike other social media scheduling tools, CoSchedule primarily focuses on content versus solely social performance. Features such as the "ReQueue" Bucket allow teams to recycle and schedule their best messages automatically without having to lift a finger. This results in more fresh content in your brand's feed faster.

3. Feedly

Feedly is a scheduling tool with an emphasis on content curation. 

Knowing what to post is a major challenge several brands face when it comes to growing their online presence.

Digging for fresh pieces of content can be both time-consuming and tiring. Meanwhile, you don't want to solely post your own stuff over and over, right?

That's where Feedly comes in.

Feedly's platform automatically curates content to fill up your social media calendar. Instead of scrambling for news or relevant pieces to publish to your audience in-between your own scheduled social media posts, Feedly does the legwork for you.

Again, managing your social feeds shouldn't eat up all of your free time. Tools like Feedly take the pressure off of marketers to constantly save and bookmark content for future sharing.

Oh, and Feedly integrates instantly with Sprout Social. Nice, right?

4. Airtable

Airtable brings the processes of content planning and social media scheduling together. The platform can be used among teams or individuals to not only plan out future pieces of content but how those posts will be promoted across various social sites.

If you can't tell by now, social media scheduling and content creation go hand in hand.

Every time you sit down to knock out a blog post, you probably already have your audience in the back of your mind.

You want to craft pieces that have potential to get shared around like crazy. You want to get as much mileage as you can via social sharing so that piece of content is seen by as many people as possible.

That means planning out your content, plain and simple.

Another nice bonus of Airtable is its asset manager. This feature affords users a sense of consistency across your campaigns and ads prior to hitting "publish."

In short, Airtable allows you to stay one step ahead by assessing what your social media posts will look like before your content even goes live. Never hurts to be prepared, does it?

5. Tweetdeck

Tweetdeck is a free social media scheduling tool that’s focused on Twitter. Its simplified interface allows you to engage across multiple Twitter accounts.

Integrating with Twitter in an instant, Tweetdeck represents a straightforward scheduling tool that allows you to queue tweets across multiple accounts.

Set up your Tweet, pick a time and watch it go live. Nothing fancy, but effective nonetheless.

Despite its simplicity, Tweetdeck also boasts a comprehensive Twitter dashboard for users. You can see your live feed in addition to notifications, mentions and other activity all in one place.

You can save tweets for future posting. Also, Tweetdeck gives you an instant view of all your pages with options to re-order or customize your view.

Tweetdeck represents a totally free upgrade to your Twitter account. Even if you use another tool for scheduling Twitter posts, you might consider toying around with the platform just for fun.

6. Planable

Planable boasts many features typical of today's' social media scheduling tools with an emphasis on teamwork and collaboration.

Most notable is Planable's commenting and approval system for scheduled social media posts. Team members are able to go back and forth with comments to fine-tune scheduled content before it goes live. Users can then approve the posts internally or wait for client approval if working as part of an agency team.

Roles and permissions allow different departments to collaborate so that everyone is on the same page. This leads to fewer bottlenecks and greater transparency as a post moves from Point A to Point B.

Planable also has labels for organizing content and an AI tool for brainstorming social media content ideas.

7. Sked Social

Sked Social is an Instagram-first scheduling tool, but also allows you to schedule posts to other social networks.

Sked Social's content queue allows users to prep photos, captions and hashtags for repeated use. The platform provides a real-time, drag-and-drop preview of your Instagram posts before they go live. This allows for quick and easy changes if you're not happy with your feed's aesthetics.

Built-in post templates and a variety of photo editing filters are nice creative touches to help your posts pop, too. The platform itself is highly intuitive for those working with visual content on Instagram.

8. Post Planner

Post Planner assists with the process of content creation, in addition to scheduling posts. Again, you can't just blast your own content over and over if you want to grow your following.

You can find content ideas for what to post and schedule it right inside Post Planner. This can be from sources like Reddit subreddits, streams, RSS feeds and content suggestions.

Post Planner curates star-rated content based on engagement ratings when you search for a profile or keyword. This scheduler chooses the best times to post based on your audience's insights.

9. StatusBrew

StatusBrew offers an extensive dashboard for teams to schedule content on social media. You can group profiles and users, set up approval workflows and tag posts. This scheduling tool has features to track campaigns, competitor accounts and content engagement.

10. MeetEdgar

MeetEdgar is a scheduling tool that works for more than social content. It works for blog posts too. This tool itself is Edgar. But, its web page is the introductory floor where you meet Edgar. You can A/B test your post to see what appeals to your audience.

11. eClincher

eCclincher is a social media scheduling tool that works well with multiple channels and auto-publishes blog posts. It suggests related content that you can schedule. You can attend to all messages, comments and mentions in one place. Also, you have access to an image library with millions of free photos and editing features.

12. NapoleonCat

NapoleonCat is a social media scheduling tool that allows teams to categorize and label content. It has a post preview feature to see what your posts will look like after they’re published. This scheduling tool has a simple interface. It offers role-based permissions to team members, and an option to keep tabs on competitors.

13. Sendible

With Sendible, you can schedule posts to not only social media channels, but WordPress, Tumblr and Medium blogs. You can also find ideas for what to post through RSS feeds, and content and trends suggestions.

Sendible allows users to schedule content in bulk and customize on-brand images. Also, teams can improve their social strategy through automated reports.

14. SocialBee

SocialBee is a scheduling tool with a seamless user interface.

The tool has a category feature that allows you to group content based on their usage. You can add different variations of a particular post to see the best-performing—A/B testing. Also, you can create reports to discover ways to improve your strategy.

15. Zoho Social

Zoho Social is another social media scheduling tool that helps businesses build their online presence. With this scheduling tool, you can create and schedule posts, monitor relevant hashtags, and manage your leads all in one place. It also suggests the best times to publish your posts.

16. Iconosquare

With Iconosquare, teams can save time on content planning and scheduling for social media platforms.

This tool has a simple interface, and analytics and reporting features. It allows you to track relevant hashtags and mentions of your brand. You can stay up-to-date on industry benchmarks and what competitor brands are doing.

What should you look for in a social media scheduling tool?

Only you know what your organization needs.

You need to consider certain factors to ensure you choose the best scheduling tool for your brand’s social growth.

Here are three things to consider:

Brand and team needs