Success in e-commerce is a far-fetched dream if your social media management is not up to the mark. Advertising on social media forms a crucial part of business nowadays. Irrespective of whether a business is online or offline, social media helps you reach a wide range of customers in little time.
Social media advertising can yield miraculous results. However, it can be a tiring job if you are not used to it. The job of social media management requires an amalgamation of creativity, quirk and hard work. From designing graphics, choose apt pictures and picture-perfect captions, the job is a lot more demanding. You also need to be updated on what’s happening in social media and news. This will help you to seamlessly integrate news and memes into your brand promotion.
How to Save Time?
The amount of time spent on social media can be used in other works related to your online business if you hire a social media manager. You can focus on team building, product development or improving supply chains and let them manage the social media game. If you are a bootstrapped startup, you can start by using social media management tools, free or paid according to your budget. Such stools allow you to manage your social media presence across different platforms.
With these social media management tools, you will automatically be able to schedule your posts and track results on different accounts. Free plans are available which can be upgraded to a paid plan if needed.
What is the difference between free and paid social media management tools?
Social media management tools that are free offer limited features as compared to paid ones. Paid tools have advanced features that enable more scheduled posts per day and better monitoring of post-performance.
What is social media management?
Before everything else, one needs to properly understand social media management. For the unversed, social media management is a section of social media marketing that manages multiple accounts across different platforms and keeps them updated with regular posts. The main goal is to establish a strong presence on social media with consistent posts.
Social media tools will make publishing content on multiple platforms an effortless job because of the automation mode. From sharing similar content on all the platforms to customizing posts for particular social media accounts, all can be done with the help of these tools. To analyze and monitor engagement on your posts, you can take the help of analytics and accordingly develop social media strategies for the target audience.
Besides scheduling posts, and tracking social media posts performance, these tools also allow you to maintain communication with your customers on different platforms- all from a single source. Though a majority of social media tools are available on a subscription basis, many provide free-version with scaled-back functions. Below are some free social media management tools which you can consider for your Shopify store:
- Snapchat Ads
- Shopify Inbox
- Predis
- Social Bar
- MeetEdgar
- Social Scheduler
- Outfy
1. Snapchat Ads
Snapchat Ads was launched on November 20, 2018, and is available in the Shopify App Store. You can address millions of youngsters through this app by crafting your social media posts accordingly. Snapchat helps you to reach your target audience via Dynamic Shopping Ads.
You can create full-screen ads and even optimize social media campaigns to boost sales with the help of Snap Pixel. You can even sync your Shopify catalog and track the performance of your social media campaigns with the help of advanced analytics. Snapchats Ads is available free of cost. However, you need to pay a monthly subscription for a few advanced features.
2. Shopify Inbox
Shopify Inbox lets you manage all messages from your customers from one spot. Launched on August 14, 2019, it is available in multiple languages including English, Danish, Korean and Thai among others. You can even create automated messages like greetings and FAQs.
This free messaging tool lets you check customer information such as products viewed, products in the cart and previous orders while chatting. You can send pictures and recommend products without quitting the chat box. Besides fast automated replies, you can even offer personal coupon codes and discounts to encourage customers to buy more products and retain them.
3. Predis
Predis is an AI-powered content creation and social media automation tool available on the Shopify app store. Launched on March 22, 2022, this app enables you to effortlessly convert your products into social media posts. You can also easily create TikTok videos, and Instagram reels and make use of its hashtag suggestions to trend.
Predis offers unlimited ideas for your social media posts and even generated automated captions. The tool allows you to automatically post on TikTok, Facebook and Instagram among others besides scheduling your posts. Above all, you can keep an eye on your competitors. With the free plan, you can run 10 competitor analysis in a month. Its paid plans start from $25/month. To avail of more advanced features you can opt for $49/month pack.
4. Social Bar
Social Bar is a tool that helps you to add different social media icons to your e-commerce website in order to increase social media proofs. Customers automatically develop trust if they see your brand’s strong social media presence. This can also improve conversions and customer retention.
Launched on April 27, 2020, Social Bar can be customized according to your needs. It supports over 50 social media platforms including Patreon, Telegram, Ebay, Discord, Spotify and Fiverr among others. Free to Install plan is for growing Shopify stores where entrepreneurs need to pay per unique impression. The basic plan of Social Bar starts from $2.99/month.
5. MeetEdgar
Meet Edgar launched in March 2023 helps you increase engagement and revenue. You can save a lot more time with this social media post-scheduling tool. It imports content to social media platforms like product type, name, price and description directly from the store. Shopify merchants can even integrate their products with different social media platforms.
Merchants can include weekly automation time slots with the help of a calendar. Edgar comes with a unique feature of keeping your social media updated even when you haven’t scheduled anything manually. Its monthly plan starts from $29.99/month and goes up to $49.99/month and $24.92/month in an annual plan.
6. Social Scheduler
Schedular is a tool launched on April 13, 2022. Available on Shopify App Store, this app comes with an automation tool that makes social media posting easy to schedule across multiple platforms. It also allows the automatic posting of your Shopify products.
You can also share and update your Shopify catalog on any social media site. Social Scheduler has social media templates for posts. One can also create customized templates. This app is free of cost.
7. Outfy
Outfy is a social media app that helps you create interesting collages, videos, gifs and many more engaging content for your social media. Outfy also has an automation feature so that you can be relieved from the hassle of posting on a regular basis.
Launched on October 2, 2015, Outfy is available on Shopify App Store. It also provides hashtags and templates which you can customize to reach your target audience. The paid plans of Outfy start from $15/month and increase to $30/month and $60/month.
How to choose the perfect free social media management tool for your e-commerce business?
One tip you should keep in mind while choosing the free social media management tool apt for your business is the feature. Prioritize the features which you think are necessary for your business growth. Free plans come with limited functionality, hence check the things which are important for you like the total number of posts in a month and a total number of platforms supported in the plan.
