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Here are the tools that will help your franchise get from ideation to analytics tracking on social media.
As a franchise business owner, you’re spinning a thousand plates. From hiring great staff to ensuring a high level of customer service, you’ve got plenty of tasks to be juggling as a local franchise business.
But, one of the most important parts of your marketing strategy needs to be this: getting your social media marketing right to attract your ideal customers at scale.
Even if you’re not a social media marketing pro, you can still share high-impact content to your franchise brand’s social media accounts. All it takes is having the right social media management tools in place to make planning, creating and scheduling posts a breeze.
Luckily, we’ve rounded up the best social media marketing tools on the market to help your small business nail your social media strategy and grow your social networks with ease.
What are social media marketing tools?
As a business on social media, your job is to attract, capture and convert your target market. Especially as a franchise business, it’s important to make every single social media post count and work towards a tangible business goal.
Even with a savvy social media strategy in place, you still need the right support and insider marketing tools in place to get the best results. And that’s where social media marketing tools come in.
These platforms, apps and tools all have one thing in common: to help your business get the best results on social media. From designing your social media graphics to post scheduling to pinpointing trending topics in your industry, social media tools give you the edge against your competitors.
What are the different types of social media marketing tools?
But, not all social media tools do the same job. So, let’s run you through the main tool categories you need to know about.
Social media management tools
The most common category of social media tools is this: social media management tools (also known as social media scheduling tools). As the name suggests, these tools assist with planning and scheduling your social media content.
While each dashboard and tool is slightly different, the main features of social media management software and tools include:
- Composing posts by curating and uploading videos, imagery and assets and crafting captions
- Suggesting hashtags, location tags and best posting times
- Allowing you to easily repost and repurpose content across different social channels
- Letting you schedule posts ahead of time and batch your content creation process
- Giving you a preview of your social media grid ahead of publishing
This tool is a must for franchise owners as you’ll be managing multiple social profiles at once. Rather than posting content in the moment, these social media tools allow you to plan, create and schedule social media posts in advance using in-built content calendars.
Plus, if you need to get your content approved by your franchisor or head office, you can allow them to review and edit posts prior to publishing within these tools.
Social media listening tools
Want to understand how your customers and the general public feel about your franchise business? You need to sign up for a powerful social media listening tool.
In a nutshell, these platforms tune into conversations about your brand online and on social media to give you an idea of how your brand is received by customers.
They capture the sentiment social media users have towards your brand, help you analyze social media campaigns quickly and easily and can help you find gaps or opportunities in your industry (before they become trending topics).
Social media monitoring tools
In a similar vein, social media monitoring tools allow you to review conversations about your brand at scale. Rather than having to check the social inboxes and notification tabs of each social media profile, you can read and respond to all engagements through a single inbox.
These tools are one of the best ways to provide timely customer support on social media.
Plus, you can set up filters for words, phrases to branded keywords to speed up your response times and jump onto important conversations quickly.
Social media analytics tools
Data and analytics are the foundation of every great social media marketing strategy. So, having a social media analytics tool will give you more in-depth insights into how your franchise brand is performing on social media.
Whether you’re measuring Facebook impressions, retweets, Instagram Reels engagements or anything in between, these analytics tools can give you the metrics and analytics reporting you need to make data-driven decisions.
With these tools in place, you can:
- Track the performance of your social media content at scale and across multiple channels
- See which social media campaigns and posts are driving the best results
- Review your audience on social media and see what content they’re engaging with
Graphic and visual design tools
The other important category of social media tools is this: platforms that help you design, produce and create visual content.
From easy-to-use graphic design software to video editing tools, these platforms allow you to create thumb-stopping, branded content for your franchise business on social media.
Why should franchise businesses take advantage of social media management tools?
So, why should your franchise business invest in social media marketing tools? Ultimately, it comes down to working smarter, not harder and giving your team members the tools to succeed on social media.
Still not convinced? Here are a few key reasons why you need to tap into the power of tools on social media:
- It saves your team time in the content planning and creation process: rather than posting content ad hoc, social media tools give you the opportunity to plan posts in advance, preview your feed before it goes live and create a seamless continuity between posts.
- It makes collaboration between local teams easy: using one dashboard, your team can add comments, suggest edits and see what content has been performing the best to make collaboration easy (even if your team is working asynchronously).
- It allows for seamless content review and approval processes: as a franchisee, your content will probably need to be reviewed by head office before going live. So, a social media management tool is a handy way to communicate with your broader team and get posts live sooner.
- It helps retain consistency across your local franchise businesses: by using templates on graphic design tools, you can ensure every post your team shares captures your brand’s visual identity and matches your franchise brand guidelines.
13 of the best social media tools to skyrocket your success as a franchise owner
Ready to take your social media presence to the next level? Let’s run you through 13 of the must-try social media management platforms, tools, apps and programs to help your franchise business stand out through social media marketing.
1. Canva
For all things graphic design, you can’t look past the design tool, Canva. With templates for absolutely everything, Canva is the ultimate web-based program to help you bring your franchise brand to life through graphic design.
Within this platform, you can upload your brand’s logo, fonts, colours and craft a range of customisable templates to use across every social media platform.
It’s also the ultimate tool for collaboration, with team folders, real-time collaboration and in-built comments to help you go from idea to execution in minutes (not months). Plus, Canva offers stacks of high-quality stock imagery and video footage to get your assets whipped up quicker than ever before.
2. Sked Social
Obviously, we’re a tad biased, but we reckon Sked Social is the ultimate social media management tool and piece of social media management software for franchise businesses.
From Instagram to Facebook, Twitter, Linked and even Google My Business, Sked Social allows you to create, schedule and analyse all of your social media content for your franchise business.
Our tool lets you manage multiple accounts from one dashboard, giving you everything you need to plan your social media calendar, collaborate and review posts, tag products, people and locations and get your content posted on auto-pilot.
Plus, you visually plan your feed, create a media library for all your branded assets and even enjoy unlimited posts across all social media platforms.
Want to get your ALL of your franchises up and running on social? Chat with one of the Sked Team to see how we can get you set up, end-to-end, start to finish.
3. Buffer
For a powerful all-in-one social media management tool, Buffer is a great tool to consider. This platform allows you to analyse, publish, engage and more.
Integrating with all the major social media platforms, Buffers lets business owners schedule content, measure performance in a few clicks and even engage with customers in record time.
Buffer’s engagement tools make it a powerful social media monitoring tool that can help your franchise business build a loyal following.
You can easily reply to comments from your desktop, prioritise important conversations (based on machine learning that picks up the sentiment of conversation) and use hotkeys and smart emojis to reply in seconds.
Learn more about how Buffer compares to Sked Social in our detailed Hootsuite vs Buffer vs Sked Social review!
4. Hootsuite
Another tool that lets your franchise business easily manage all your social media marketing is Hootsuite. Designed to help you save hours in your week, this social media management tool helps you produce quality content, grow your social following and see what is and isn’t working.
From social listening features to in-depth analytics, Hootsuite is another all-in-one tool that can take care of your social media marketing from post planning to monitoring campaign performance.
Learn more about how Hootsuite compares to Sked Social in our detailed Buffer vs Hootsuite vs Sked Social review!
5. Sprout Social
If you’re looking for a comprehensive social media management tool, it’s worth checking out Sprout Social. This tool covers everything from social listening to engagement and publishing along with offering a stack of analytics tools to explore.
With coverage across Facebook to Pinterest to Instagram and tonnes of different pricing plans to consider, Sprout Social can be a great platform for franchise brands.
Learn more about how Sprout Social compares to Sked Social in our detailed Agorapulse vs Sprout Social vs Sked Social review!
6. Lightroom
Looking for the ultimate photo editing tool? Look no further than Lightroom by Adobe, a market-leading platform that is perfect for franchise businesses wanting to level up their visual content on social media.
Whether you work on desktop or mobile, the Lightroom mobile app seamlessly integrates across all devices (including both android and iOS). Plus, it’s a platform that offers both step-by-step instructions to help you nail the basics as well as advanced features to cater to editing pros. Best of all, you can pair this program up with your other Adobe subscriptions to lower your pricing plan.
7. Unfold
Ready to stand out on social media? You need to hit download on Unfold by Squarespace, an incredible graphic design app that allows you easily create beautiful social content.
With a focus on Instagram content, Unfold offers hundreds of sleek templates to bring your Instagram Stories, Reels or feed posts to life. This design tool also offers stacks of filters and effects to give a branded look to your photography in a few taps.
Plus you can even plan your Instagram grid in advance and create a bio site for your link in bio. If you’re ready to take your franchise branding to the next level, you need to try Unfold.
8. ContentCal
Struggling to plan your social media content in advance? Juggling a stack of campaigns on different channels? Rather than creating a manual spreadsheet, try the social media planning tool, ContentCal.
This platform offers an easy way to navigate your content management across your entire marketing efforts. You can map out your campaigns, create category tags (to filter by what you’re looking for) and streamline approval processes to speed up your workflow, too.
With pricing plans starting from $30 per month, there's a plan to suit every business.
9. Iconosquare
Want to skyrocket your social media performance? You need to try Iconosquare, a powerful social media analytics tool with tonnes of helpful functionality.
This platform offers integrations with Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter and delivers time-saving reporting and analytics to help you make data-driven decisions.
From assessing your best posting times to providing a detailed split of your organic vs. paid analytics, Iconosquare will help you focus your efforts on content that will drive results for your brand.
10. Buzzsumo
Want to use influencer marketing to grow your reach and brand awareness on social media channels? Make sure to explore Buzzsumo, a powerful content marketing platform with incredible influencer marketing tools.
This tool lets you look past vanity metrics to uncover truly influential leaders who can move the need for your franchise location. Plus, you’ll score detailed metrics on potential influencer partners, including retweets and other social media analytics.
11. Unsplash
Want polished and professional photography, but don’t have the time or budget to invest in a professional shoot? Stock imagery library, Unsplash is the next best thing.
This site is filled with thousands of royalty-free images you can download and customise to suit your social media and digital marketing needs. The best bit? This photography doesn’t look like stock imagery to help you deeply engage and connect with your customers on social media.
12. Animoto
Video content is a winning content format on social media, and there’s no better way to produce bite-sized content at scale than with Animoto.
This incredible video maker tool gives you the tools to bring professional videos to life. With drag and drop features and the ability to customise every element to align with your franchise’s branding, Animoto is a brilliant and cost-effective way to harness video marketing for your business.
13. Klear
Another must-try influencer marketing platform is Klear, a tool that allows your brand to build trust through influencers (not Facebook ads).
In one easy-to-use platform, your franchise location can discover the most relevant influencers in your local area, analyse who has the strongest engagement and manage these relationships using a handy in-built CRM.
Plus you can even measure the success of your partnerships using their beautiful reporting software.
14. Keyhole
Last, but certainly not least, is an epic social listening and analytics tool. Keyhole is a user-friendly tool that allows your franchise business to monitor what people are saying about your brand in real-time and generate brand and competitor reports with ease.
Not only can you listen across multiple social media networks but you can measure campaigns and trending topics to help inform and refresh your social media strategy.
And that’s a wrap! When it comes to nailing your social media presence as a franchise business, having the right tools by your side will speed up and supercharge your success. From crafting your visual content to collaborating on social media posts and even reviewing your results, these social media tools are a must-try for any franchise owner looking to grow and scale through social media marketing.
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