Tools for Marketing and Content Creation

Link sharing on social media is always an adventure. Some social media platforms make it easier than others — Instagram allows you to link directly from your Stories and in your bio — but adding a link to your TikTok bio is still a fiddly process. In this article, I’ll walk you through exactly how to add a link to your TikTok bio step by step, why it might not be working for you (and what you’ll need to do to overcome that), plus a way to direct your followers to multiple links with Buffer’s free link-in-bio tool. ⚡Plan, create, and schedule content to grow an engaged following with Buffer's TikTok scheduling and analytics tools. Jump to a section: Why a website link m…

Every few months, we take stock of the quiet progress happening across Buffer. These aren’t flashy features or full-on launches — but they’re the kinds of updates that make everything feel smoother. Lately, the Buffer team has been doubling down on quality (alongside all the headline-grabbing stuff). Here's a look at all the small changes and quality-of-life improvements you'll now find in your Buffer dashboard. How we’ve been improving quality at BufferBug fixes and small improvements have always been part of the job. But we're a small team, and in the past, they sometimes had to compete with bigger feature projects. Recently, two teammates — Adam, our Senior Escalation…

At Buffer, we build with customers, not just for them. If you’ve seen my LinkedIn posts asking for quick chats, that’s why. Real conversations sharpen our product thinking, so whenever we start exploring a new idea, we talk to the people using Buffer every day. As a product manager focused on how our users create content, these conversations are particularly helpful in understanding how users come up with ideas and where Buffer fits into their workflows. As we explored improvements to Buffer’s content creation and scheduling experience, I spoke with 30+ users across industries and goals: solopreneurs, team managers, and creators growing personal brands. We wanted to unde…

LinkedIn used to be the place you'd dust off your resume and hunt for your next job. Today, that’s just a sliver of how people are using the social platform. A quick scroll now throws up founders building in public, creators sharing their wins, and hot takes on everything from positioning to pricing to — of course — AI. And while businesses are still hiring on LinkedIn, many are also pulling back the curtain to show what life inside their company really looks like. This evolution has opened up serious opportunities for both brands and creators. With over 1 billion users, LinkedIn has grown into a place where B2B professionals, creators, and businesses alike can grow thei…

Barry Greene has spent the past three decades helping students master the art of jazz guitar, both as a professor at the University of North Florida and through his own online lesson platform. His teaching journey took an unexpected turn in 2007, when he uploaded a casual video to YouTube. What started as a fun experiment quickly gained traction. As Barry recalls, 'within months, I was teaching masterclasses overseas.' Over time, Barry built a thriving online community of guitarists who rely on his lessons to develop their technique, explore jazz harmony, and stay inspired. With growth came a challenge: keeping up with social media demands without sacrificing time for cre…

The social media management tool you choose can set the tone for how you grow your presence. You want it to be easy and flexible — without stretching your budget. Buffer and Later are two names you’ll see often, each offering different ways to help you schedule posts, connect with your audience, and analyze performance. If you’re weighing your options between Buffer and Later, you’re in the right place. The key differences and similarities to look for between them are: Jump to a section: Buffer vs. Later features overview Plans and pricing Social media scheduling and planning Capturing ideas and planning content Social media engagement Soci…

Recently, we realized our way of calculating MRR and ARR wasn’t giving us the clearest picture of our business. A few months ago, we made the decision to cancel the Buffer subscriptions of 1,361 inactive annual legacy subscriptions. We let those customers know they can always use Buffer for free or sign up for an annual plan again. After sending that email and canceling the annual plans, we braced for a $14,000 monthly recurring revenue (MRR) drop. But the numbers didn’t budge. We knew something was off when we didn’t see the immediate impact of cancelling those subscriptions. Instead, those cancellations were being stretched across the next 12 months, tied to each custom…

Until fairly recently, I admit that YouTube Shorts weren’t a priority in my social media mix. Then I scheduled a YouTube Short for a Buffer blog I was writing, and happened to check the analytics. 1,436 views in just a few days — that’s more than all my other videos combined. Taking a deeper look at my analytics, it’s clear that YouTube Shorts are doing all the heavy lifting: This power performance of these bite-sized videos is not just anecdotal. According to Buffer’s data, engagement on YouTube Shorts is on the rise (from 3.95% to 4.71%), with usage skyrocketing from 5.6K to 147K in just 18 months. YouTube Shorts offer a unique opportunity for creators to reach a wide…

Instagram has officially launched the feature folks have been clamoring for for years. Hello, shiny new repost button. 👋 Users have been reposting content on Instagram since the app's release, but with this new feature, they’ll no longer have to rely on screenshots and third-party tools to share the content they love. Even better: This new mechanic will ensure the original creator will get credit for their work. I’m pretty excited that Instagram took the time to perfect this. Because when done right, sharing Instagram content from your community, customers, or collaborators can help you celebrate them and stay consistent on the platform. Talk about a win-win. Whether you'…

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…

Everyone says consistency is the key to growth on social media: more likes, more shares, more leads. And they’re right — Buffer’s own data shows that consistent posting can multiply engagement across platforms. What few people talk about is how on earth you actually do it. And more importantly, how do you make it sustainable, so you don’t burn out two weeks in? When I left my role as a marketing manager to go solo as a Notion builder and creator, I knew that showing up regularly would make or break my business. But this time, there was no team, no external deadlines, no boss asking for drafts. I was my own boss. It was just me, my ideas, and the blank page. That meant I n…

I hit 20,000 followers on LinkedIn in August 2025. The number itself is worth celebrating. After all, who doesn’t love a milestone number? However, it has also led to much reflection about where and why I started on the platform. This was the first year I set a clear growth goal for LinkedIn, and reaching it gave me a reason to pause and ask: What actually drove this growth? What changed along the way? And what comes next? In this article, I’ll share the strategies that fueled my growth, the opportunities that came with hitting 20K, and the challenges I’ve had to navigate along the way. I’ll also share how I plan to approach LinkedIn (and content more broadly) in this nex…

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…

I'm not TikTok famous. I don’t have a blue checkmark on Instagram, nor am I a LinkedIn Top Voice. But I have a modest following across all three platforms, which I have been able to monetize. I’m what some influencer marketers might call a nano-influencer, comfortably in that under-10K follower range. (I prefer the term nano-creator, but potato, potahto.) It’s not a full-time income — this year, I’ve netted around $3,000 directly from my content. But that’s if you don’t consider the spin-off work that has come from my social media presence, like freelance writing gigs and podcast hosting. Since I create content outside of my full-time job at Buffer and don’t spend more th…

Spend five minutes on the “how to grow” side of TikTok, and you’ll quickly learn one thing: if you’re not posting multiple times a day, you’re doing it wrong. Or so the algorithm experts say. As a fledgling TikTok creator, I’ve always been a bit sceptical of this advice. I managed to build a small audience within about a year by posting a couple of times a month, rather than daily. But… would I have been able to get more views on TikTok if I had? I put the question to Buffer’s data scientist, Julian Winternheimer. And because he never does anything by halves, Julian analyzed a massive dataset to find the answer: 11.4 million TikTok posts from over 150,000 accounts. We (b…

“If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” I bet you’ve heard this one from Peter Drucker, one of the best-known thinkers and writers on the subject of management theory. And maybe that’s why you’re here: You know that growing on TikTok isn’t just about posting videos — you need to dig into the data to see what actually works. But, if you’re anything like me, when you first open the TikTok analytics tab, it feels like staring at a spaceship dashboard. Numbers, charts, percentages … Where do you even start? The good news is that you don’t need to measure everything; it’s more important to measure the right things based on your goals. The magic happens when you focus …

Social media marketing is more complicated than ever. You need a proper strategy, content creation skills, copywriting formulas in your back pocket, and a knack for tying it all together. It doesn’t hurt to borrow the hard-earned lessons of industry experts who’ve come before you. Here are the top 12 courses to improve your social media marketing skills. Some of these courses are free. But even the paid courses are worth every penny, I promise. There are two types of courses on this list: Cohort-based courses: These courses have a fixed start and end date. You’ll work through the material in real time with other students and your instructor(s). These courses are excellen…

Remember when social media content was limited to Facebook statuses and, er, “pokes?” Even a few years later, cutting-edge content was limited to a blurry photo with an oversaturated filter on Instagram. It seems bizarre now, given how much you can do with social media today. With the ever-growing list of platforms releasing new features daily, it's an exciting time to build a following online — but it's not an easy one. With the plethora of social media content options available every time you open your favorite app, it can be difficult to know what type of content your audience most wants to see. Short-form video? A carousel? A good old-fashioned selfie? Well, that all…

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…

I’ve been freelancing for two and a half years. And that’s exactly how long it took me to make LinkedIn work for me as a tool to grow my network and get clients. For a long time, I’ve gotten sporadic results. Discovery calls that led nowhere, very few leads, and a single client with a one-off project. But looking back at how I approached my LinkedIn presence, it all makes sense. I combined short, impulsive bursts of creativity with months-long escapes from the platform. And my results reflected that. As a freelancer, it’s easy to get lost between 20 different acquisition strategies, client work, and administrative tasks of running your business. Without a structure in pla…

BFCM — Black Friday and Cyber Monday — is an exhilarating but often daunting time of year for business owners and marketers. Now that fantastic deals are table stakes, it can feel like shouting into a crowded room to ensure your brand gets the attention it deserves. But capturing market attention is well worth doing over this high-spend period. According to Adobe Analytics, Black Friday 2024 alone generated $10.8 billion in online sales (up 10.2% from $9.8 billion in 2023), and Cyber Monday saw $13.3 billion. The full 2024 holiday season reached a record $241.4 billion in online spending, making 2025 poised for another record-breaking year. To help you stand out from th…

We’ve all been part of the rush to figure out gifts for family and friends as the holiday season approaches. Many companies even recommend starting holiday shopping (plus social media and email marketing campaigns) months early to avoid shipping delays or out-of-stock notifications. The holiday season often means a busy time for brands — and that’s what events like Black Friday and Cyber Monday intend to capitalize on. But sentiments are changing. People are questioning and expecting more of the brands they shop from and 89 percent of shoppers say they would be loyal customers of a brand associated with a good cause, given similar price and quality. Brands are also sayin…

As a freelancer, I always wondered, “What would happen if I needed to take an extended medical leave?” I’m not the kind of person to take a month-long trip, and I’ve never taken more than 7-10 days off at a time (which requires meticulous planning ahead of time!). If I don’t work, my revenue is $0. I run a solo business, so my income is 100% dependent on me. So what would happen if I couldn’t work? Would my clients understand? Would my social media engagement take a nosedive? Would my business crumble? I found out this year when I was diagnosed with a brain tumor. Not exactly what I was expecting. I needed brain surgery, and recovery was expected to take a minimum of six…

Over the past decade, Instagram has grown exponentially, with more than a billion monthly active users. However, with that increase in users has come an equal rise in fake accounts. You’ve probably received a weird-looking comment or direct message on Instagram that you could immediately tell was a scam. But fake accounts are becoming increasingly sophisticated as they take on a more “human” tone. Scammers create these fake profiles to spread false info, steal your personal details, and sometimes even bully people online. As an Instagram user, you have the power to spot fake accounts and take them down, and in this article, we explore how to do that. Jump to a section:…

Staying consistent on TikTok sounds simple enough. But coming up with video ideas, filming, editing, writing captions, and posting nearly every day? That’s a full-time job — with overtime. That is, unless you work smart. Scheduling your TikTok videos ahead of time is like unlocking the “easy mode” of consistency — giving you more breathing room and better results. In this guide, I’ll walk you through exactly how to schedule TikTok posts (on both desktop and mobile) and help you find the best method for your workflow. Jump to a section: How to schedule TikTok posts on desktop How to schedule TikToks on desktop using the TikTok web browser …