And automate the posting of your content to all your social networks in one click (Facebook Pages, Facebook Groups, Linkedin, Twitter, Instagram, etc…)

What: Definition of Social Media Automation

Social media automation is using software tools to reduce the amount of time spent on social media tasks that don’t require a human touch.

You should be able to schedule your posts ahead of time and push your content to all the social networks in one click.

Why? The Pain we try to solve

Let’s say you are a social media content writer in a startup, a blogger, or an influencer, you are ready to share a new piece of content then you need to post it on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or Linkedin. It’s a very simple time-consuming task that you can automate.

How we can solve the pain: Build a Social Media Automation workflow with Zapier

We are going to create the following workflow:

Step 1: I create my post content directly in Slack from a Form. I can schedule it ahead of time and I can select the social networks I want to share my content.

Step 2: The post is published on all the selected social networks and at the scheduled time.

Ready? So let’s build it!

1 — Install the Slack apps Forms and set up the form

Go into your Slack app directory and install the Forms app. Once it’s done click on Create a new form and you should see the Form Creator.

Now you can add the following fields to your form

• A Custom Select to select the different social networks you want to share your content with. Activate the option multiple-choice values as we want to select several social networks.
• A date picker to schedule the day of the post
• A custom select for the time of the post with the values formatted below

• A single line input for the URL link of the post you want to share
• A multiline input for the text of the post you want to share

Then you can set up the form info as below

Click on Preview and save it if you are happy with the result

2 — Set up the Automation workflow in Zapier

First, go into the Forms app in Slack and click on Zapier in order to grab your Zapier API Key

Then go in Zapier, select as a Trigger a New Form Response in Forms for Slack and connect your account.

A pop up will show up and will ask you to copy paste the Zapier API Key generated in the previous step.

Step 1 : Action New Form Response in Forms for slack

Step 2 — Filter Only continue if…

Set up a filter as described below, this zap will be for the Facebook Group only. Then we will duplicate this Zap and modify this condition for each of the social networks.

Step 3: Path — Conditionally run..

Next you have to set up an Action of type Path in order to set up the condition on the Scheduled Post vs Not Scheduled Post

The path will be triggered only if a Scheduled Date is provided.

Step 1 of the Scheduled Post path —Action of type Delay Until

You can set up the “Date/Time-delayed until” using the values provided by the user in the form.

Step 2 of the Scheduled Post path — Action of type Post Message in Facebook Groups

Once it’s ready let’s turn on the Zap and test it!

3 — Test your Social Media Automation Platform

Go in Slack and type /form newpost (title of your form)

Fill up your form and then click on the submit button and BOOM! Here is your Social Media Automation Platform result:

4 — Duplicate your Zap for each of the Social Networks you want to share your content with

Once the zap is ready, you can now duplicate it and apply it to other social networks. It should take only 2 minutes to set it up. Let’s do it

Go in your Zaps and click right on the Zap you just created and click on Duplicate.

Let’s rename it to Social Media Automation Platform — Linkedin

The first thing to modify is the value in the Filter of Step 2. The Zap will continue only if the Select your Social Network input contains the value Linkedin.

The second thing to modify is in your two paths:

Choose an action of type Create Share Update in Linkedin

Then set it up with the data input from your Form. Don’t forget to apply the same change to the second branch of your path and activate your Zap.

Your Linkedin automation is set up. You can now duplicate this Zap and repeat the same process with Twitter, Instagram, Facebook Pages, Facebook personal profile, etc…

And that’s if for now! You just built your own social media automation platform in less than an hour, for free, and with advanced capabilities such as selecting the social networks, you want to share your content with and the ability to schedule it ahead of time.