Tools for Marketing and Content Creation

Scheduling is what Buffer is known for, and fair enough. But there's way more going on under the hood! Buffer has grown into a pretty comprehensive toolkit over the past few years, and some of the newer features (some of my personal favorites) are super useful in ways that go well beyond the queue. Here's what else it can do. Reply to comments across platforms, from one placeIf you've ever posted something, disappeared, and come back three days later to a pile of unanswered comments, this one's for you. Community is Buffer's unified comment inbox. It pulls in comments from Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Threads, Bluesky, and X, so you can see and reply to everything wit…

Hootsuite is a pretty powerful social media management tool. But its $99 per month starting price puts it out of reach for a lot of creators, entrepreneurs, and small businesses — and that's before you even get to the plan most people actually need. Hootsuite's free plan was discontinued on March 31, 2023 — so there's no way to get Hootsuite for free beyond the 30-day trial. When the free plan was axed (RIP), existing users were nudged toward the $199 per month Standard plan — billed annually, which means a lump sum of $2,388 upfront. Some customers chose to upgrade to keep their access to the social media scheduling tool. But for a lot of creators and small teams, $199 a…

Here's something worth knowing upfront: You don't need millions of followers or superstar status to make money on Instagram. Micro and even nano-influencers on Instagram are supplementing — or even replacing — their income with content creation. I now have over 15,000 followers on Instagram, but when I started experimenting with monetization, I had no idea what would actually work. And I tried everything. Affiliate links that made me a few bucks, brand partnerships that weren't really sustainable, and eventually a few income streams that started stacking up month after month. One of the most important things I've learned is that there no ‘easy money’ switch here — turning…

With more than 40 million registered users, Bluesky is fast becoming a decentralized force to be reckoned with — and with good reason. Among the new wave of fediverse platforms and decentralized networks, Bluesky is possibly the easiest to get to grips with, thanks to its clean interface and ever-increasing community of all sorts of creators. From science to K-pop, there’s a space for everyone on the network. If you’re new to Bluesky and the world of decentralized social media, here’s a quick summary: Bluesky was created by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, and is a decentralized social network built on an open-source protocol called AT Protocol. With the protocol, Bluesk…

Threads has over 150 million daily active users. Great for reaching new audiences. Also, a discovery problem. How do you get seen when millions of conversations are happening at once? Enter: Trending Topics for Threads, right in Buffer. It brings real-time trending conversations directly into Buffer's composer. Built in partnership with the Threads team, Trending Topics surfaces what's trending on Threads to anyone, no matter your location, through Buffer's API access. The discovery challenge on ThreadsThe Threads algorithm rewards genuine conversation and authentic engagement. Success comes from joining discussions people actually care about, at the moment they care abou…

These days, it feels like Threads is dropping new features every week. Whether it's small quality-of-life improvements or game-changing updates (we see you, Trending Topics), the Threads team has been busy since their rocketship launch in 2023. The only potential downside to all that fun new stuff for its 400 million monthly active users to play with? It's not easy to keep track! Which is where this guide comes in. Here, I’ll unpack some of the top new features on Threads by Instagram — plus how to use them to grow your following. Let's make sure you're getting the most out of Threads, shall we? Jump to a section: 1. Topics, not hashtags 2. Trending Topic…

Tried and tested strategies for growing your following on Threads, with insider tips from the Threads team. There's no doubt about it: Threads is here to stay. After a record-breaking start, Threads is fast proving that it was no fly-by-night fad but a force to be reckoned with among the other social media giants. Threads by Instagram now has 400 million monthly active users and counting. To put that into perspective, that's a little over a third of X's (formerly Twitter) monthly active users of 550 million — and X has a good 16 years on Threads. If you’re a creator, marketer, or business owner, growing an audience on the platform is well worth it. Especially if you’re in…

Since Elon Musk took over Twitter, or X as it’s now called, a number of alternative platforms have emerged to capture users who have been leaving. Some focus on tight-knit communities, while others aim to match or exceed Twitter’s original reach. One popular option is Bluesky. It’s a decentralized social network built on the AT Protocol. The platform has seen steady growth and frequent updates since launch, making it an intriguing choice for people seeking alternatives to X. Because it’s open source, developers can propose changes and potentially shape the platform’s future. 💡Schedule your Bluesky posts! With Buffer's Bluesky integration, you can cross-post to other platf…

If Ali Abdaal can’t think of a sufficiently intriguing thumbnail for his video ideas, he won’t even make the video. No matter how great the idea is, the YouTuber with 5 million subscribers revealed it’s not worth the effort of writing, recording, and editing a video if he doesn’t have a showstopper thumbnail for it — because no one is going to watch it. But wait: YouTube is a video platform, so how much can a static image contribute to your content success? Surely you can scrub to a still from your video in YouTube Studio, and you’re good to go? Turns out: not quite. There’s a good reason YouTuber MrBeast famously pays around $10,000 for a single thumbnail design and gen…

LinkedIn’s algorithm has always been a bit of a mystery — until now. The LinkedIn team has been pulling back the curtain on the algorithm in interviews with Entrepreneur, talking about how it works and why going viral isn't the goal. We've looked at two: On the website, with Editor-in-Chief and VP of Content Development, Dan Roth, and Alice Xiong, Director of Product Management.On the podcast, with Senior Director and Executive Editor at LinkedIn News Laura Lorenzetti.In this article, we’ll highlight the key points from the team’s interviews about the LinkedIn algorithm and share practical tips for applying this knowledge to your content. Jump to a section: …

Great experiences rarely come from one big moment. They’re built through hundreds of small details that add up over time. That idea guided how we spent some time this year focusing on customer experience at Buffer. Customer Experience Week was our first dedicated, cross-functional sprint centered entirely on how Buffer feels to use. We took advantage of the natural slowdown at the end of the year to form small teams, each focused on one improvement they believed they could meaningfully ship in a short window. This wasn’t our first experiment with focused building time. We’ve run initiatives like Build Week in 2022 and 2023, where teams explored new ideas and shipped exper…

Social media managers are juggling multiple plates at once every day: brainstorming content ideas and creating text and video contentscheduling posts and engaging on multiple social media accountsanalyzing social media marketing performance and tweaking strategy based on data…And a lot moreWhew. It takes some elbow grease to keep the wheels spinning. But what if you don’t have to do all that every single day? What if you could automate the mundane, repetitive tasks to social media tools and focus on your core jobs that actually move the needle toward your return-on-investment (ROI)? Enter: Social media automation aka using software to automate repetitive tasks like sched…

I’ve been fortunate that we've closed down for the last week of the year for the last eight years that I’ve been at Buffer. We kicked off this at the end of 2016 and have kept up every year since then. Closing down for the last week of the year is an opportunity to pause and recharge. It’s like a reset, except across the whole company. I love telling people about this practice at Buffer because they have so many questions about how we continue to operate while closing down for a week. As we work with many small businesses and creators who can sometimes struggle with working over the holidays, it feels especially important to share how we’re going about this. So in thi…

Our data scientist has uncovered loads of fascinating numbers about social media performance this year. The best times to post based on engagement, how often you should be posting on various platforms to maximize your reach, what the impact of replying to your comments actually is, and a whole lot more — Julian Winternheimer has been busy! But this might be his most important analysis yet. We give you: ✨ The Most Used Emojis in Social Media Posts in 2025. ✨ According to his analysis of millions of posts, these are the most-used emojis in social media posts this year. OK, OK, it’s probably not the most important, actionable study we’ve ever done… and it probably won’t help…

Big marketing dreams, but working with a tight budget? After more than a decade of marketing for bootstrapped brands, I've learned that you don't need to spend a fortune on fancy digital marketing tools to see results. It's all about building a smart toolkit that punches above its weight. One that helps you work efficiently and get results without breaking the bank. That's where this comprehensive list comes in: 28 digital marketing tools that help growing brands succeed. Many of these tools offer free or low-cost versions, so you can start small and scale up as you're ready for more features. Consider this your guide to building a powerful marketing tech stack that works…

Landing paid partnerships as a creator doesn’t necessarily require a huge following — but it does require a professional influencer media kit. Many brands and companies are happy to work with creators and influencers with smaller followings, but they’ll likely want to see some proof of your metrics and professionalism before sending you a contract or products. Enter: a media kit. Media kits are essential for social media influencers looking to monetize their work, no matter their audience size, says Ayomi Samaraweera, former TikTok employee turned creator, now the founder of Canopy, an online community for creators. Ayomi would know — she landed her first deal with only …

How do you really know if your likes, comments, and shares are “good enough”? It’s easy to stare at your own numbers in isolation and feel unsure. Sometimes, your social performance only makes sense when you can stack it up against businesses similar to yours. In this article, I’ll walk you through the latest social media benchmarks across five major platforms, giving you a clear, grounded sense of where you stand and where you can grow. I’ve used data from the following Buffer reports: Buffer’s best times to post on social media — which analyzed one million posts sent through BufferBuffer’s Instagram benchmarks — calculated using aggregated data from over 27 million post…

At the start of the year, we asked 11 experts to share their social media predictions for 2025. They pointed to big shifts — world-building, private communities, AI in everything and everywhere, LinkedIn’s rise, and a creator economy moving toward more sustainable businesses. Now that the year is behind us, it’s a good moment to pause and check the tape. Some predictions held up almost perfectly. Others played out more slowly or looked different than expected. That gap between prediction and reality is where the most useful lessons live. In this article, we’re revisiting seven themes from our original piece, from what actually happened, to where expectations missed the ma…

I don’t need to harp on how amazing Instagram can be for your business. Of its 2 billion monthly active users ( 🤯), 44% purchase products on the platform weekly. That’s a lot of potential for brand awareness and revenue. The problem is that using Instagram for business can be a tad overwhelming — especially if you’re starting today. With its plenty of (very useful and interesting) features and rapid updates, you have to juggle many moving parts to be successful on this social media platform. That’s why you need this comprehensive guide on how to use Instagram for business. We’ll cover: How to set up your Instagram business account (skip if you’ve got one already)How to op…

“How often should I post on social media?” is a question that has plagued marketers and creators since the invention of social media marketing. So, what’s the right number? In this guide, I’ll share data-backed tips on how often you should post on the most popular social media platforms. Jump to a section: At a glance: How often you should post on every social media platform How often should you post on Facebook? How often should you post on Instagram? How often should you post on TikTok? How often should you post on X (formerly Twitter)? How often should you post on Linked…

Buffer is a social media productivity tool for creators, small businesses, freelancers, and agencies. A place to schedule posts, manage comments, and track performance across Instagram, LinkedIn, Threads, Bluesky, Facebook, X, TikTok, YouTube, Mastodon, and Google Business Profiles without getting sucked into the feed. Most social media tools are built for brands with big budgets and dedicated teams. We build for everyone else: the creator just starting out, the small business owner doing everything themselves, the freelancer building a personal brand between client work, and the agency managing multiple clients without the enterprise price tag. In 2025, we shipped a lot.…

Managing multiple social media accounts can feel like a lot — especially when you're doing it solo. But with the right approach, it doesn't have to be overwhelming. If you're a creator or small business owner trying to stay active across multiple social media networks, you're probably wondering how to make it all work without burning out. This article shares seven strategies you can use (with software recommendations in between) to manage multiple social media accounts effectively. Quick summary: how to manage multiple accountsUse templates: Create repeatable formats in Canva to reduce design time and maintain brand consistency.Repurpose and crosspost: Share high-performi…

I love the idea of the mythical Instagram hack. When a social ‘expert’ pops up on my feed, emphatically telling me to do the Fate of Ophelia choreography during the full moon after every post to go viral — there’s a good chance I’ll give it a bash. (If you saw me practicing that dance in my last vlog, no, you didn’t.) The fact is, though, those hacks, in the truest sense, really don’t exist. The quality of your content is the be-all and end-all of Instagram post performance. But there are a handful of things you can do to give your content a helpful little boost. Posting at a good time for the platform can help, as can keeping up a consistent posting cadence. We have data…

If you've been wanting to post on social media but keep putting it off, this one's for you. I asked Buffer's team of creators — because creating is important to us since our product is for creators — to share what actually helped them get past the fear, overthinking, and blank-page paralysis that accompanies early-stage content creation. And their advice was refreshingly actionable. A bit of backstory: In an initiative spearheaded by Sabreen Haziq, our Senior Brand & Community Manager, Buffer's team has been transforming into a group of creators with real skin in the game. Over the past 8 months, we've collectively: Published over 11,000 postsEarned 14 million impress…

Threads might look a bit like Twitter and feel like Instagram, but the fledgling social media platform is a bit of both — and neither. Threads has been positively flying since it first burst onto app stores in 2023. In just a few years, the Meta-owned app amassed 141.5 million daily active users, with many serious superfans in its ranks (several of the Buffer team among them!). And those superfans will be quick to tell you that social media strategies for Instagram and Twitter/X aren't plug-and-play for Threads. The Threads algorithm is all its own, and — if you're serious about building an audience on Threads — it's well worth getting familiar with how it works. Whic…