12 Distribution Tools to Save You Time and Skyrocket Your Content’s Performance

Before we get started, let’s address the two major cliches that seem to come up every time marketers talk about content distribution: If content is king, distribution is queen, and the old “publish and pray” strategy doesn’t work.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s be real. Yes, distribution is important, and doing it well takes time and careful planning. But it doesn’t have to be complicated, and you don’t have to do it alone.

In addition to tried-and-true content distribution techniques and a content promotion template by your side, plenty of great options exist for helping you distribute and improve your content’s performance.

Here are some of my favorites (full disclosure: we have worked with some of these brands):

Whether you realize it or not, you’ve for sure seen Taboola in action. Taboola is a content discovery platform that recommends content across some of the most popular publications. This is a great way to piggyback off of other related articles and get more eyes on your content.

A staple for social media mangers, Hootsuite allows you to manage your accounts, follow relevant conversations, and schedule posts without the hassle. It also offers several solutions to help you manage other aspects of distribution outside of social, like its employee advocacy tool, Amplify.

Buffer is a key tool for marketers and agencies for managing their social accounts. With Buffer, you can schedule posts to make sure they’re going out to your followers at the best possible time every day, and you can post to all your social accounts from one simple platform. Plus, its analytics help you track and measure performance.

Quuu allows you to promote your content to influencers in your industry via Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+. I actually just discovered this platform and tested it out to promote my first post this month. It’s a great way to get real people to share our content, and it helps me fill up my Buffer feed!

I don’t know how our blog survived before we discovered BuzzSumo. (I’m a pretty big data nerd, so I might be biased, but I think this tool has made such a difference.) It identifies and compares trends about your content performance, as well as your competitors’ content performance. From social platform to content format and length, you can pull trend reports about your performance and make better decisions about future posts. It also gives you access to Twitter share count, even after the platform’s API changes.

Canva allows you create beautiful custom images optimized for social, and its templates make it so easy to create something that looks professional — even if your design skills aren’t great. Not convinced a pretty picture will help get your content noticed? Consider this: Visual content is 40 times more likely to be shared on social than any other type of content.

You can use Sniply to instantly make any post you share more strategic. Sniply allows you to attach a call to action on every link you share — from asking readers to check out a piece of related content to directing them to your site or to a gated piece of content. It’s a great way to capitalize on content that doesn’t necessarily have a lead generation focus.

Use CoSchedule to plan your editorial calendar and schedule content distribution all in one place. Whether you’re the sole person in your marketing department, the leader of a small team, or an executive at a large company, CoSchedule has solutions that will make your life easier and help you stay more organized, allowing you to focus on strategy and content creation.

Meet Edgar gives you more mileage out of your social media content. Only a fraction of your audience will see the content you share each time you share it. MeetEdgar helps populate your accounts with past content to ensure you’re not missing the opportunity to engage more followers with your posts.

Do you love hashtags? So do we. Tagboard uses hashtags to find and collect social media posts, and from there, robust tools allow you to choose which of the collected posts you want to feature. This platform is a great tool for events, TV, brands, and sports.

WiseStamp is a free and easy-to-use email tool that allows you to customize your signature. It works on all email platforms and can even help you build your business through one of many custom features. With the right links in your signature, you can direct potential clients to your social networks, promote your new app, provide a headshot of yourself, and more.

Click to Tweet is a unique (and free!) tool that allows you to promote, track, and share the content you post on Twitter. All you have to do is compose a message, click the “Generate New Link” tab, and share the link. It also helps you track the activity of each link so you know what’s working. This tool is the first of its kind and a must-have for companies on Twitter.

Whether you’re new to the content marketing game or you’re a content pro, these tools can help you maximize your content’s potential. And with so many options, you’re sure to find one that fits your exact needs.