One of the Facebook tools for Page Administrators that I LOVE is the ability to schedule posts ahead of time.
It is simple to do and means we can pre-plan and schedule posts to appear in the upcoming week (month or year).
This is particularly helpful when you have a busy week ahead or are heading off on holidays.
Rather than ignoring your Facebook Page, you can choose ahead of time specific images, helpful links and/or quotes that you’d like to share with your Page fans.
You can then go to your Facebook Page and schedule each one to post to your timeline automatically, on a specific date and at a set time.
The image of the posting box (image right) shows a red arrow pointing to the location of the button that allows you to schedule your posts, so you can get a sense of the process.
The second ‘View Activity Log’ image shows the confirmation message you’ll see once you’ve scheduled your post. Click ‘close’, or if you’d like to get an idea of what your post will look like when it’s made, ’View Activity Log’. (You’ll find your ‘Activity Log’ in your ‘Admin Panel’ under ‘Edit Page’)
Of course, you can also pre-schedule posts using free or paid third party apps like HootSuite and Buffer. The jury is still out on whether Facebook’s algorithm penalizes posts made through third party apps. You may be less likely to be penalized if you use Facebook’s pre-scheduler.
Pre-scheduling involves the same process as making a regular post. The only difference? You’re adding a date and time that you’d like the post to go live.
Here are a few recent posts related to changes to Facebook’s algorithm, for those of you who’d like to know more: Responding to Facebook Page Reach Decrease (in Social Media Today) and Has Your Facebook Page Reach Decreased? This Might Explain It
