Social media is a crucial aspect of your marketing strategy, but sometimes it can be easy to be overwhelmed. With so many topics that you can post and tweet about, you might not have time to do it all.
To help with this, here are seven great tools that can help you maximize your social media marketing strategy.
1. Buzzsumo
Are you turning and tossing in your sleep worrying that your competitors will gain an edge over you? Then Buzzsumo can come to the rescue.
Buzzsumo enables you to type in any URL of your choice and it'll tell you which of that website's content is ranking best on social media. Once you've spied on a few of your competitors, you'll have a pretty good idea of which content will give you an edge over them. You can also use Buzzsumo to find out the highest ranking content based on keyword.
2. Feedly
If you're racking your brain trying to come up with ideas about what to post on social media, help is on the way. Somewhat similar to the now defunct Google Reader, Feedly enables you to add blogs to your RSS feed so you can stay on top of the latest news and views in your industry. You can use this to get ideas about your own blog and social media posts, or you can use their sharing option to directly share the latest blog posts from your feed to Facebook or Twitter.
But remember, just like you don't want endless junk stuffing your email inbox, you also don't want to have to waste your time sorting through drab blogs, so stick with the best of the best.
3. TrendsMap
Do you feel that your Twitter account is somehow marginalized, sitting off at the sidelines while everyone else takes part in the big fun? Then maybe you should start using TrendsMap, which conveniently informs you about all of the most trending topics and exciting discussions taking place in your part of the world.
Via TrendsMap, you can find out what's trending in each part of the world. People often search Twitter for these trending topics, and the good part is that all recent tweets will be displayed, no matter if it was tweeted by the President of the United states or the drunk in the furnace.
By tweeting about these topics - especially if you can somehow tie them in to your niche - you can gain valuable exposure and new followers.
4. Hashtagify
Somewhat a similar idea to TrendsMap, Hashtagify tells you all you need to know when it comes to hashtags. You can find the most trending hashtags in general, or the most trending hashtags about any particular topic.
Using these hashtags will help you be found by Twitter users searching for them. This way you get a part in the action and gain valuable exposure at the same time.
5. Statweestics
Another useful tool to find out the most trending topics, hashtags, users, words, locations, and more with live-time updates is Statweestics. They will tell you the top 500 of all of these categories in 60 different languages.
6. FollowerWonk
FollowerWonk helps you analyze your Twitter followers to find out a range of insights, such as when they're most active. This can be a tremendous help in planning your schedule.
7. Stweet
A cute little tool, with a name juxtaposed of the two words street and tweet, Stweet uses Google Maps to show you tweets based on geographical position, with a real view of the places the tweets are originating from.
Use these tools to plan out your postings on Twitter and other social media.
This post originally appeared on The Fried Side blog