As the Buffer team grows we’ve been able to make some awesome adjustments to our mobile apps, including some great new features. In case you missed some of the recent additions, I’ve collected a run-down for you of how they work in our Android and iPhone apps.
We’ve also included a few features that are easy to miss and might be a good bonus, which should make your Buffering much easier. Look for them towards the bottom of the post!
Getting started with Buffer on mobile
If you don’t have our app installed on your phone already, you can download the iPhone version from iTunes or the Android version fromGoogle play.
Add your accounts
When you open up the app, you’ll be able to sign up with one of your social network accounts: either Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. Just tap the network you want to sign up with and login to give Buffer access to your account.
Once you have accounts connected, you can add more with the link at the bottom of your accounts list.
Using Buffer to manage your updates on the go
Sending your first update
Get started by adding your first update from the mobile app. On Android, tap the pencil icon and you’ll see a new post screen where you can type your update, attach photos, choose a time to post and select the accounts you’d like to send it to.
When you’re done, tap the green Buffer button to add the update to your queue, or tap “Share Now” to send it right away.
Managing your updates
Keep an eye on how well your posts are doing by tapping the analytics tab. Under each post you’ll see the interactions for each post you’ve sent.
Tap on the Buffer tab to see your queued posts. You can tap a post to edit it, or tap and hold with your finger to drag and drop.
What’s new: Twitter auto-complete and custom scheduling
Our new features have made both of our mobile apps faster to use and more robust replacements for Buffer when you’re away from your desk. You can now add updates to your Buffer account more quickly and with more control.
Twitter autocomplete
We recently introduced a Twitter autocomplete feature that’s not only fast, it’s smart too. When you’re typing an update in one of our mobile apps, just type an @ symbol and start typing letters after it. Autocomplete will jump in and suggest some usernames for you to choose from:
Custom Scheduling
Another really exciting new feature we introduced recently is the ability to choose a specific date and time for your update, rather than adding it to a slot in your Buffer queue.
In the iPhone or Android app, tap the clock icon to set a time and date for your update to be sent.
When you’re done, you’ll see that your custom-scheduled posts are shown with a grey background behind the chosen time, so you can easily differentiate between these and your normal Buffer posts.
New networks
With our recent additions of Google+ and LinkedIn company pages, you can now have up to 7 types of accounts connected.
With a free Buffer account, you can connect one profile or page per network. This means you can share content to Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ and App.net all at the same time.
If you sign up for an Awesome account, you can pick and choose any 12 profiles from all of the types we have on offer:
- Twitter profile
- Facebook profile
- Facebook Page
- Google+ Page
- LinkedIn profile
- LinkedIn Page
- App.net profile
To connect a new account in the iPhone app, slide open the menu on the left and swipe to the bottom of your accounts list. Tap on “Connect an Account” and choose the social network you want to add:
From here you’ll be taken to the relevant network to login and give Buffer access to your account. Then you can choose which profile or page you want to add.
7 bonus features you might have missed
Our mobile apps have some really cool existing features as well, that are easy to overlook. I wanted to highlight a couple of these in case you hadn’t seen them before.
1.) iPhone: Shake-to-shuffle
One of my favorite iPhone app features is that you can shuffle your Buffer queue by shaking the phone. Just open up the app to show your queued updates and shake the phone in your hand.
You’ll see a confirmation message, and once you tap “Yes” your updates will be shuffled randomly. This is super handy if you share a few quotes from the same article or a few links from the same site in a row, and you want to mix them up.
2. Analytics
In the iPhone app we have a tab for your analytics, where you can see the interactions each of your posts has received. Just open up the app and tap on analytics at the bottom of the screen:
3. Android: Share from any app
On Android, our app takes advantage of the built-in share menu that shows up in most apps, to let you add updates to Buffer from anywhere on your device. Once you have Buffer installed, just tap the share menu inside another app like your browser or Pocket and tap on Buffer to send an update to your Buffer queue.
Here’s an example of how this looks when sharing from Google Chrome:
4. Schedule Native Retweets
In the Twitter for Android app, the share menu lets you send a tweet straight to your Buffer queue—where we turn it into a native retweet.
Other ways to share from mobile
5. Infinite Buffer’s Windows Phone app
Grab the Infinite Buffer Windows Phone app to keep your Buffer updated on the go.
6. Buffer for BlackBerry
If you have a BlackBerry device, you can keep up with your Buffer account using our BlackBerry app.
7. Schedule Buffer updates straight from Echofon
If you’d rather have Buffer right inside your Twitter app, our Echofon integration is for you. Grab Echofon for iPhone or Android and you can add tweets to your Buffer account without leaving the app.
You can even schedule your Retweets with Buffer, from right inside the Echofon app.
[Source]
No comments:
Post a Comment