How do I use Link Sharing?

Share the details and results of your social strategy using Link Sharing in Sprout Social. You can share links to your Publishing Calendar along with your Reviews Feed.

If you’re a Premium Analytics customer, you can share your reports with stakeholders regardless of whether they have a Sprout account or not. Customers with the Listening add-on can share a link to their Listening Insights, even if your stakeholders don’t have a Sprout account.

Sharing these links helps you:

• Increase transparency with external stakeholders who can access your calendar or reports without logging into Sprout
• Strengthen your alignment by creating links that dynamically update
• Provide context by adding additional details for calendars and reports so your stakeholders know exactly what to look for

This article contains the following sections:

• Enabling Link Sharing
• Sharing Calendar links
• Sharing report links
• Sharing Listening Insights
• Sharing the Reviews Feed
• Viewing and managing links

Enabling Link Sharing

Link Sharing is enabled by default for Sprout accounts. If Link Sharing isn’t enabled, the Account Owner can enable this feature and choose whether to make links invite-only or public.

To enable Calendar Link Sharing as an Account Owner, navigate to Settings > Global Features > Link Sharing. 

Here you can enable link sharing and choose whether the link sharing option is Invite-Only or Invite-Only and Public. 

Invite-Only means that only recipients you specify can access the link. The recipients you specify can then access the content from a link they receive in an email, or a link you provide them with directly. 

Invite-Only and Public means that anyone who clicks the link can view the content.

Sharing Calendar links

When you’re in the List View of the Publishing Calendar, you can create a Shared Link to send to stakeholders and other members of your team. There is no limit to the amount of active Calendar Links you can share at one time.

To create a Shared Link:

1. Ensure your filters are updated to show the content you want to share in the link. Consider the date range, profiles and post types you want to share.
   
   
2. Click Share, and then click Create shareable link. The Shared Links window appears.
   
   
3. Edit the following fields:
   • Title - enter a descriptive title for the link
   • Description - enter key details about the link to provide context to your stakeholders and team members.
4. Verify the Calendar Details, Profiles and Post Types are accurate in the Filter Menu.
   
5. Choose your Shared Calendar Date Range.
   • Select Date range from filters or Dynamic date range. If you choose Dynamic date range, select your date range from the dropdowns. When you enable Dynamic date range, the date range is based off of today's date and not the date selected on your calendar filters.
     
     
6. Click Share. The Link Share Settings popup appears.
7. Enter the email recipients in the Share with people textbox if you want to send out invites to specific people, and then click Share. Alternatively, if you are creating a public link, you can copy the link directly by clicking Copy Link.
   
   
8. Toggle Send email to notify if you’re sending out invites to specific people. Enter information about the link you’re sharing and how to access the link.
   
   
9. (Optional) Enable Link Expiration by toggling this switch to ON and add a date for when you want the content to expire and no longer be accessible.
10. Click Send.

You can also grab your link from the Link Drawer located in My Links. From the Link Share Settings window, you can also resend invitations to recipients, or revoke their access to the shared link.

Sharing report links

If you’re a Premium Analytics customer you can send Shared Links for the following reports:

• Profile Performance
• Facebook Pages
• Instagram Business Profiles
• Twitter Profiles
• LinkedIn Pages
• Pinterest Performance
• Cross-Network Paid Performance
• Facebook & Instagram Paid Performance
• Twitter Paid Performance
• LinkedIn Paid Performance
• Custom Reports created through the Report Builder
• Tag Performance
• Post Performance
• Facebook Competitors
• Instagram Competitors
• Competitor Posts
• Reviews Overview Report

To create a Shared Link for a report:

1. Ensure your filters are updated to show the content you want to share in the link. Consider the date range and profiles you want to share, as well as any filters you applied.
   • Note: Shared Links for reports respect the selected date range by default. If you don't want to share the date range you selected, make sure to update the date range before creating a shareable link.
2. Click Share, and then click Create shareable link. The Shared Links window appears.
   
   
3. Edit the following fields:
   • Title - enter a descriptive title for the link
   • Description - enter key details about the report to provide context to your stakeholders and team members
   • Date Range - select the date range you want to include in the report or toggle the dynamic date range to ON so your report updates automatically.
4. Click Share. The Link Share Settings popup appears.
5. Enter the email recipients in the Share with people textbox if you want to send out invites to specific people, and then click Share. Alternatively, if you are creating a public link, you can copy the link directly by clicking Copy Link.
   
   
6. Toggle Send email to notify if you’re sending out invites to specific people. Enter information about the link you’re sharing and how to access the link.
   
   
7. (Optional) Enable Link Expiration by toggling this switch to ON and add a date for when you want the content to expire and no longer be accessible. 
8. Click Send.

Sharing Listening Insights

If you’re a Listening add-on subscriber, you can create links to your Listening insights. To create a Shared Link:

1. Ensure your filters are updated to show the content you want to share in the link. Consider the date range and profiles you want to share, as well as any filters you applied. Your link will show content based on your currently selected filters and in your current timezone, which may be different from your viewers’ timezone. 
2. Click Share, and then click Create shareable link.
   
3. Edit the following fields:
   • Title - enter a descriptive title for the link
   • Description - enter key details about the link to provide context to your stakeholders and team member.
4. Verify your Report Details.
   
5. Click Share . The Link Share Settings pop-up will appear.
6. Enter the email recipients in the Share with People textbox if you want to send out invites to specific people, and then click Share. Alternatively, if you are creating a public link, you can copy the link directly by clicking Copy Link.
7. Toggle Send email to notify if you’re sending out invites to specific people. Enter information about the link you’re sharing and how to access the link.
   
8. (Optional) Enable Link Expiration by toggling this switch to ON and add a date for when you want the content to expire and no longer be accessible.
9. Click Send.

Sharing the Reviews Feed

You can share the Reviews Feed with your stakeholders. To create a Shared Link:

1. Ensure your filters are updated to show the content you want to share in the link. Consider the date range and profiles you want to share, as well as any filters you applied. Your link will show content based on your currently selected filters and in your current timezone, which may be different from your viewers’ timezone. 
2. Click Share, and then click Create shareable link.
   
   
3. Edit the following fields:
   • Title - enter a descriptive title for the link
   • Description - enter key details about the link to provide context to your stakeholders and team member.
4. Verify your Review Details and make any changes as necessary.
   
   
5. Click Share. The Link Share Settings pop-up appears.
6. Enter the email recipients in the Share with People textbox if you want to send out invites to specific people, and then click Share. Alternatively, if you're creating a public link, copy the link directly by clicking Copy Link.
7. Toggle Send email to notify if you’re sending out invites to specific people. Enter information about the link you’re sharing and how to access the link.
   
   
8. (Optional) Enable Link Expiration by toggling this switch to ON and add a date for when you want the content to expire and no longer be accessible.
9. Click Send.

Viewing and managing links

After you create a link, you can share it with stakeholders and team members who need insight into your Publishing Calendar, Reports or Listening Insights. 

Viewing a shared calendar

Recipients can open the Month or List View from a direct link in their email (shared by invite) or can click the public link to open the Publishing Calendar. They’ll see the following:

• The calendar date range you selected
• The social profiles you selected to include 
• The content types you selected to include
• The List View of all the messages for the date range you selected 

If a recipient clicks an expired or deleted link, they receive an error message. 

Viewing a shared report

For shared reports, recipients can open the direct link in their email (invite only) or click the public link to open the report. They’ll see the following:

• The date range you selected
• The profiles you selected
• The report charts, data and tabs

Note: If you believe that a link was shared with someone who shouldn’t have access to your data, remove their access by expiring or revoking their access. An Account Owner can also disable Link Sharing for the entire account, which shuts off access to all links.

Viewing Shared Listening Insights

Recipients can open the direct link from their email (invite only) or click the public link to view Listening Insights. They’ll see the following:

• The Reporting Period you selected
• The social profiles you included
• The sentiment classifications you included
• The content and message types you included
• Any other filters
• The report tabs

If a recipient clicks an expired or deleted link, they’ll receive an error message.

Managing Links

You can manage the links you create from the Link Drawer by clicking

From this drawer, you can:

• Preview the link
• Update your sharing settings
• A indicates that the link was shared with a certain number of people
• A indicates that the link is public

From the Edit panel, you can edit the link’s attributes or delete the link. If a link expires, a red expiration message appears and shows the date the link expired.

If a link is nearing its expiration date, and not all the parties have viewed your shared link, update the date range to avoid the expiration. 

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