One of the reasons that people give for not engaging in social media more often than they do is the time factor. It does take time to interact with others on social media, but luckily there are some tools that can make the job faster, a little easier, and possibly more fun.

One of those tools is HootSuite, a social media “dashboard” that allows users to monitor and post to multiple networks at the same time. HootSuite can even manage multiple Twitter, Facebook, WordPress, LinkedIn, Google+, and Foursquare social profiles. Free accounts are able to connect with up to five social media profiles, while HootSuite Pro users can connect to unlimited social profiles.

Several customizable options (such as the appearance and organization of the dashboard) and user permissions make this tool especially useful. For instance, the Team Collaboration feature allows you to have multiple contributors to your social profiles without sharing passwords. You can assign messages to certain team members to make sure the right people are following up on posts, and schedule and monitor messages and responses.

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