Using the Social Media Manager Autolist feature to automatically post a blog

FAQ Contents

1. Autolist feature rules of thumb

• As a rule of thumb - you should use the 160 character limit on your posts to get people to click the link and to keep your post punchy. Think of a search engine entry that you might click on which basically has the Page Title as the headline as click bait. It's kind of the same idea.

• Keep the Max Characters field in the RSS Link field low enough to not give you too much to think about - enough to grab the URL and enough to recognise the post with, that's it. Then change the post message to be unique, punchy and relevant.

• We suggest you use a URL shortener and even turn on the Shortener in the AutoList to reduce chars.

• We suggest you setup a post specifically for LinkedIn, Facebook and GMB (Google my Business) and do a separate post setup just for Twitter & Instagram. The post can still be automated, but it needs to be structured differently - much shorter and snappier due to the character limits and requirements you have. Decide how important or not the image is. If there is no great image, Instagram is a waste of time.

• You should ALWAYS create a unique message for each Auto blog post rather than use the one pulled from the Post automatically. Keep the URL - that's important.

I cannot seem to add an AutoList in Planning. Nothing happens when I click the menu link on the left.

This happens if you haven’t connected up any social media accounts to SMM. Your Website should also be connected first for an autolist to work. Once those accounts are connected in SMM, you’ll be able add an Autolist.

2. Character limits
It doesn't seem to like the number of characters I am using

• First of all, spaces are included in your character limit.

• Different Networks have different character limits. Twitter is 160, Linked In is 3000 and Facebook is 6200

3. Automatic posting/publishing problems onto Instagram
I cannot automatically publish a post to Instagram using Autolist

Instagram requires a picture to be uploaded before it can be published - no pic no post! If you don’t have Instagram Network turned on in the auto list before the blog post that you want to publish is pulled in, then it cannot use just the blog preview link that the other networks use. You need to physically choose a photo to upload or add a link to a picture for Instagram. To avoid manually doing it see the article about posting to Instagram using autolists.

4. Autolist feed not showing my most recent post
My feed isn’t showing my most recent post / my recent post is missing in the autolist

1. Click the RSS feed link

2. Check ‘show previous 'X' posts’ is selected and then Save as you may have already posted and its disappeared.

3. If still not there, check the blog post in VIA is live ('Show on Website') and that your API is turned on

4. Otherwise have you already posted it before and not got the repeat button on? If so then your post will most likely have been removed from the autolist as it's not going to be repeated after its been published.

5. Getting errors in Red

I get a red error above my Autolist post

This is a character or image missing issue for a specific Social Media Network. At the bottom left it should say which network and what the specific error is. It's most likely Instagram or Twitter limits and image requirement that is causing this.

6. Prefixes and Suffixes

What is the prefix and suffix for in the RSS Feed Link in Autolists?

1. Prefix is what you want to be put generically in the post heading. I would leave this blank as you don't want a generic heading. Its clickbait and should be unique.

2. Suffix is what goes at the end of your post, and I would recommend adding the generic hastags here only. Any unique ones add to the post itself. Don't double up on hashtags though!

7. Max Character field
What is the Max Characters field for in the RSS Feed Link in Autolists?

This is how many characters are pulled from your Webdadi Blog post into the auto list post ready to use, not how many characters you are limited by. Each Social Network has its own specific character limit for posts so you need to decide how many characters you are going to use for your autolist post depending on the networks you post to and how tailored you want your auto posts to be.

8. Images not showing in the post

My image and post is not showing and not going through to the specific blog’s page.

• You most likely haven't included the blog post's URL in your Social Media Manager post. We suggest you copy and paste it in, and use a URL shortener like the one that is built-in which needs to be turned on. Alternatively, you can use BIT.LY to gauge the number of characters you are using more easily. You can always upload a specific image to use with each post in the auto list if you prefer.