How can I customize my social posts using Compose?

Compose is the tool to create new messages to post to your social profiles connected to Sprout Social from desktop and mobile. This article contains the following sections:

• What media can I upload?
• Can I preview posts?
• Can I tag locations?
• Can I mention other users?
• Can I add links?
• How do I make my posts more accessible?
• What are my publishing options?

What media can I upload? 

You can add images, GIFs and video to your outgoing posts from your computer, Asset Library, Bynder, Canva, Dropbox or Google Drive.

Click to select your media source or drag and drop an image or video from your computer. A thumbnail preview appears in the Attached Images section once your media is added.

Read more about Media Upload Types and Size Limits

For photos, click to crop and edit, add Alt Text or remove the image.

Click Save to save your image and the newly edited version appears in the thumbnail preview.

Note: You can only upload 1 GIF per post in order for it to animate when published.

Can I preview posts? 

As a best practice, you should preview posts before publishing them. In fullscreen, Compose shows you a preview for each network included in the Profile Picker on the right-hand side of the screen. Edits appear in real-time as you add to your post.

When working in compact Compose, click . This enables you to preview both the desktop and mobile experience of your post. You can toggle between those networks by clicking the tabs along the top of the view for each profile you picked.

If you're adding more than one image to your post, you can drag and drop the images in the order you want them to appear.

When adding videos to your posts in Compose, you can click Video Options to add a video title, subtitle or select a video frame as a thumbnail from Facebook, Instagram, Twitter PRO, LinkedIn and Youtube videos. You can also select a frame from your TikTok videos, but can't upload a custom thumbnail photo.

From the menu you can also upload a thumbnail, crop and edit your video and remove your video.

Can I tag locations?

When creating posts, you might want to add a location to tag your own business address to let customers know where you're located. Or you might be sharing content from an event at a new location. You can tag a location for your Facebook or Instagram posts.

To add a location:

1. Click
2. Choose Facebook or Instagram.
3. Enter the name of the location and select it from the list.

Note: You can only tag locations that have an associated Facebook Page. You can add cities, regions, countries and specific places, so long as they have an associated Facebook page.

Can I mention other users?

When creating posts, you’ll sometimes want to mention other users. Each network has their own specifications, and some won’t allow you to mention users when included in the Profile Picker in-tandem. For example, you can't mention someone on Twitter and Facebook at the same time. To do this, we recommend using the Save + Duplicate feature outlined towards the end of this article. The network rules are as follows:

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn

You can mention a Company Page when only Facebook or LinkedIn are chosen in the Profile Picker. Personal Profiles aren't supported. You can mention any Twitter handle when one Twitter profile is attached in the Profile Picker.

Instagram and Pinterest

To tag a Personal or Business Profile on Instagram, @mention the profile in the text of your post. Due to network restrictions, this doesn't produce a list of profiles from which you can select. Remember that you can test that you mentioned the correct profile by following the hyperlinked profile handle in the Network Preview, next to the Compose window.

Pinterest doesn't allow third party apps like Sprout to tag individuals or businesses.

Can I add links?

Compose supports hyperlinks. After you enter a link, a horizontal box appears giving you the option to shorten the link. Any metadata gathered from the link entered also appears.

Clicking Shorten Links automatically shortens included links with a bit.ly URL. 

To edit metadata, click  beneath the trashcan icon. Not all networks support edits to metadata.

To read more about metadata, read this helpful article about URL metadata. If you want to learn more about Facebook Link Ownership, read this article outlining the details. 

Note: If you have a vanity bit.ly link shortener, you may connect your account to Sprout. To do so, navigate Account and settings > Settings > Account Settings. Scroll down to Settings by Group and connect your bit.ly account to the target group.

How do I make my posts more accessible?

You can include alt text and SRT files to your posts to make them accessible for the widest audience. An SRT file is a plain text file that includes subtitles for video content. In Sprout, you can add these to your video posts using this workflow.

Sprout also offers an alt text option as well. Alt text describes the appearance or function of an image on the web, helping users understand what the image shows. For Facebook, X and LinkedIN messages you can add alt text with this workflow.

After you add alt text, you can use the Publishing Calendar or Asset Library (for Advanced + Professional Plans) to see at-a-glance which assets and posts have alt text and which don't. 

Want to learn more about the art of creating inclusive content? Check out our exclusive Arb event Inclusive Social recording or our 8 accessibility guidelines guide.

What are my publishing options?

Once you finish your message, you have a few ways to manage how to publish it. By default, posts are set to post immediately. Clicking on the dropdown reveals additional content management options.

Drafts

If you choose to save your content as a draft, it gets placed in the Drafts folder within the Publishing section. If more than one network was attached in the Profile Picker, Sprout saves a draft for each network.

Drafts are collaborative as well, and get saved in a central directory. Any user with the appropriate publishing permission can edit drafts.

Schedule Manually

Time-sensitive content like posts surrounding a promotion or campaign is best suited for the Scheduler. When you choose Specific day and time, a Choose Date space appears. Days that already have scheduled content appear with a dot beneath the date. 

Once you select a day for your post, you can then specify a post time. Sprout enables you to post down to the minute, making the release of your content look as natural as possible. You can also select the timezone you want to use for your posts by clicking Advanced Scheduling. Not only can you pick your ideal timezone for your posts, but Optimal Send Times also update to your selected timezone to remove the guesswork.

Note: You can schedule content up to 13 months in advance.

What are Optimal Send Times?

In addition to choosing specific times manually, users on Professional and Advanced plans have the option to select from up to seven automatically generated Optimal Send Times. Click Use Optimal Send Times to choose from a list of send times generated by ViralPost 2.0.

The listed times have a star rating–one to five stars–based on how ViralPost determines the time's anticipated effectiveness, with five being the best.

ViralPost calculates Optimal Send Times by looking at your audience's engagement with your selected profiles. In instances where there isn't enough data, it suggests Optimal Send Times based on the overall optimal times for the selected networks, based on your configured time zone.

Note: You may schedule a post for multiple days. To get started, click Add another date. You can't schedule the same post multiple times in the same day via Sprout. Networks may natively deem repetitive content as spam. 

Sprout Queue

Most content, such as tips about your product or evergreen blog posts, are not time-sensitive. This content is best suited for the Sprout Queue. 

Read more about the Sprout Queue and ViralPost and how to leverage these tools.

Compose Workflows

Quickly publish and duplicate new messages in succession from with the Send + Duplicate workflow.

Send + Duplicate delivers your message and reopens Compose with the same message, including any attached assets, ready to edit for other profiles or networks.

Send + New delivers the existing message and reopens a blank Compose with the previously-selected profiles. Using this feature, you can create new content more efficiently for a selected profile or group of profiles.

 

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