Read Time: 5 minutes

How To Choose the Best Enterprise Social Media Management Tool

Enterprise social media management tools make it significantly easier for a company to create and publish content and interact with its customers on social media. An enterprise social media management tool will provide one user-friendly interface for content creation and analytics on key social networks, like Facebook, Google My Business (GMB), Instagram, and Twitter. Below we go over the most important enterprise social media management tools and how to choose the right ones for your organization.

 

What is an Enterprise Social Media Management Tool?

An enterprise social media management tool is software that provides social media management solutions for large and/or multi-location companies, allowing them to create timely, on-brand content that is relevant to corporate headquarters as well as for all other locations. Branding may differ by location, making it hard to merge corporate and local messaging. What’s more, many social media networks generally do not scale with a changing company. These networks by themselves are not always malleable enough to work with a company through changes to its team members, company structure, branding expectations, or product offerings.

 

A flexible, centralized system allows for transparency between team members and streamlines the on-brand content creation and publishing process. Other tools, like dynamic tokens and localized tagging (for example, a location’s specific phone number or address) and social listening improve messaging and customer interactions. Integrations with essential business software, like customer relationship management (CRM), or content enhancement apps like Canva, are other enterprise social media management tools that enhance a company’s marketing performance.

 

5 Key Features to Look for in Enterprise Social Media Management Tools

 

1.   Central Command with Flexibility for Diverse Teams

Companies with a wide reach, 100s or 1,000s of locations or multiple teams need enterprise social media tools that provide a control center for the creation and publishing of content. However, such a system should be flexible too, allowing collaborating teams to change or share roles.

 

For instance, content may originate at corporate headquarters and be posted across profiles representing different locations. On the other hand, satellite locations or franchisees may produce their own content without corporate oversight. Then there is a hybrid approach where corporate and satellite offices work together in creating and posting content.

 

Given these varying levels of content responsibilities across company marketing teams, enterprise social media management tools will ideally balance centralization and flexibility at the local level. For example, local teams can create content that is approved by corporate, or corporate can create pre-approved content aligned with branding guidelines.  Such an approach makes responsibility between team members clear and allows for a social media presence that is consistently on-brand.

 

2.   Dynamic Tokens and Localized Tags for Localized, On-Brand Messaging

Companies with multiple locations often need to post content that blends corporate messaging with location information.

 

Let’s take a company’s nationwide sale as an example. Corporate headquarters will create the crux of the content that outlines the sale information. Details about each location, including store hours and address, will be included in the content, and posted to the corresponding local social media accounts.

 

Typically, this requires local contacts to alter the corporate-created template and add in their locale information, and then publish the content to their own social media profile. This piecemeal method is inefficient, taking up the time of employees across countless locations, and lends itself to error.

 

Dynamic tokens and localized tags are two enterprise social media tools that facilitate the blending of corporate and local content. A single post is created from a central command that automatically incorporates local information and posts the content to the corresponding social media accounts.

 

3.   Scalability for Ease of Use During Change

Companies change in many ways over time, like launching new products, opening new locations, adding team members, or acquiring other brands. Companies need enterprise social media tools that scale with them. Tools and features like libraries of pre-approved content and a feature that suggests the peak times for publishing allow companies to publish at-scale, on-brand content.

 

4.   Social Listening for Smart Management and Data-Driven Marketing

Sometimes called sentiment analysis, social listening is a tool that analyzes opinions circulating on social media about a brand. More than counting likes and followers, social listening does a deeper dive, tracking hashtags, comments, and tags. With sentiment analysis, brands can implement reputation management initiatives faster during a problem or crisis. Additionally, brands can obtain real-time data on customer and potential customer sentiments that can guide messaging and marketing initiatives.

 

For example, a brand may receive an increase in social media mentions following a new ad campaign. Social listening analytics provides invaluable insight into how the public is responding to the ad campaign. In turn, the company can make data-backed adjustments to the campaign and use the information to guide future marketing initiatives.

 

5.   Improved Workflow with Software Integrations

Customer management software, like CRM technology, is used across many companies. Enterprise social media management tools with CRM integrations simplify workflow for improved customer interactions. Customer service protocols are streamlined, and richer contact data is provided at every moment of the customer experience.

 

Additionally, app integrations are must-have social media management tools for improved content. A good example is social media integration with Canva, a popular graphic design app with templates for eye-catching content creation. Some apps enhance the customer experience, such as integrations with Google My Business that facilitate a fast, branded response to customer questions.

 

 

How to Choose the Best Enterprise Social Media Management Tool

 

To help your company choose the right enterprise social media management tools, answer the following three questions:

 

1.   How Many Social Media Profiles Do You Have & Who Is Managing Them?

If a company’s social media presence is limited to a handful of profiles that are managed by a single person or team, then a social media tool with basic scheduling and analytics tools should be sufficient.

 

Alternatively, a company with 100s or 1,00s of profiles that are managed by a large team, or many teams with varying levels of interaction, will need enterprise social media management tools that facilitate this complex social media management arrangement. The ideal system has a centralized command that can automatically post to any account in the network. Such a system will also be flexible so that both local and corporate teams can work independently or collaborate on content creation and publication.

2. How Complex Are Your Online Customer Interactions?

A company with an extensive digital presence has multiple points of contact for customers to reach out to the business, including via business websites, social media comments, messaging, and Q&A forums. To complicate matters, a company may receive questions or feedback on every social media profile they have on every network they use – like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Google My Business.

 

Inadequate or untimely responses to customer feedback can undermine customer trust in a brand. Enterprise social media tools – like timely notifications, task assignments, and smart rules – make it easy to quickly respond to customers with accurate, on-brand information. For example, SOCi’s Google My Business integration empowers local teams to rapidly prioritize, assign, and respond to customer questions in a way that aligns with corporate oversight.

 

3.   What Is the Extent of Your Localization Needs?

Synthesizing corporate and local messaging on social media is a constant challenge for multi-location companies. Franchisees, independent owners, authorized realtors, co-ops, property managers, and other local employees need to post localized content in keeping with corporate branding guidelines.

 

The solution to this problem is an enterprise social media management tool that gives collaborating marketing teams flexible levels of control over the content creation and publishing process. For companies that need blended localized-corporate messaging, enterprise social media tools with features like dynamic tokens and localized tags allow corporate-created content to automatically pull in local information and post to relevant accounts.

 

 

Learn More About SOCi, an Award-Winning Enterprise Social Media Tool

 

If your company has complex social media management needs, learn more about SOCi’s award-winning software. It is specifically designed for companies with multiple locations and can streamline your workflow and enhance your content for a more dynamic social media presence.