What are the best AI social media tools?

AI social media tools are useful for op­tim­ising content creation and man­age­ment across various networks. Depending on the type, scope, and design, these tools are suited for a wide range of tasks.

What are AI social media tools?

AI social media tools are powered by ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence and make content creation, pub­lish­ing, and analysis easier. They act as as­sist­ants that handle tedious tasks and improve the accuracy of your posts. The range of tools is broad: some help develop new strategies, others assist with topic research and content creation. They can even take over aspects of social media mon­it­or­ing or parts of com­mu­nic­a­tion with your community.

Of course, there are also all-in-one solutions that handle various tasks, in­teg­rat­ing them to be used from the initial planning stage all the way through to later eval­u­ation and op­tim­isa­tion. This not only saves numerous steps but also sim­pli­fies usage, helping to avoid errors.

The five best AI social media tools

There are numerous AI tools for social media and the market is con­stantly growing. However, as this is still a young tech­no­logy, not all solutions are really mature yet. The following five AI social media tools are currently among the best options.

Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a complete AI social media manager and as such offers numerous options and tools for your company’s strategy. Tools such as the in­teg­rated Ow­ly­Writer automate the creation of captions and basic idea gen­er­a­tion. There’s an option to plan and schedule posts and AI helps to find the best time slot. Content is adapted directly within the dashboard and can be prepared for various social media platforms so everything remains ‘under one roof’. This also applies to mon­it­or­ing and analysis. All posts can be com­pre­hens­ively evaluated to optimise the strategy.

Hootsuite is available with a one-month free trial. If you want to continue using the tool for your social media planning afterward, it will get a bit more expensive. The cheapest package starts at around £80 per month. For multiple team members, ad­di­tion­al accounts, and extra features, you’ll need to budget for a mid-range three- to four-figure amount. While this is man­age­able for large companies, es­pe­cially con­sid­er­ing the benefits, it can be a sig­ni­fic­ant financial burden for smaller busi­nesses.

FeedHive

FeedHive too is an AI social media manager that combines numerous features. It includes an AI-driven writing assistant to help create posts. You can manage multiple channels and platforms sim­ul­tan­eously, op­tim­ising your strategy in the process. Op­tion­ally, follow-up tasks for par­tic­u­larly suc­cess­ful or less suc­cess­ful posts can be generated and automated. Community in­ter­ac­tion can be stream­lined, making it easier to manage. Of course, com­pre­hens­ive analytics are available with the right package. The dashboard is very intuitive and user-friendly, so even beginners can quickly get the hang of it.

The price is ac­cord­ingly higher than with spe­cial­ised al­tern­at­ives. The cheapest package, billed annually, costs around £15 per month. Solutions for small and medium-sized busi­nesses with larger teams and multiple channels range from around £80 to around £240. The manager doesn’t always interact smoothly with all third-party programs.

DALL-E 2

One of the most popular AI tools for social media is DALL-E 2. The program is based on OpenAI’s GPT-3 model and can be used to generate high-res­ol­u­tion images from simple text in­struc­tions. The quality of the images is generally im­press­ive but depends heavily on the original input. The more precise this is, the more suitable the final image will be. In addition to abstract art, photoreal­ist­ic images are also possible.

Payment is now sub­scrip­tion-based, not via credits. The cheapest package costs around £11 per month. Depending on the input and com­plex­ity, multiple images or gen­er­a­tions may be needed for certain results. While the pricing may be slightly higher than com­pet­it­ors, the results are often good. Non­ethe­less, it’s best to use this AI tool for social media se­lect­ively and combine it with real images for a balanced approach.

Lately AI

The AI social media post generator Lately AI should also be used with caution but can then generate real added value. The tool creates posts based on your long-form content, con­sid­er­ing your brand’s tone and messaging. While it doesn’t generate original content, it’s well-suited for con­vert­ing longer formats into shorter ones, thanks to its user-friendly interface.

Lately AI uses a sub­scrip­tion model, with a free trial available. The cheapest package costs around £46 per month.

Flick

Flick is a social media man­age­ment tool that enables you to plan and customise posts for different platforms. A standout feature of this AI tool is its hashtag man­age­ment cap­ab­il­it­ies. It analyses hashtag per­form­ance and suggests effective ones based on com­pre­hens­ive data, allowing you to collect and archive suc­cess­ful hashtags for future use.

The packages start at around £9 per month. Larger companies pay around £55. There is a one-week trial period.

When are AI social media tools useful?

AI-powered social media managers can sig­ni­fic­antly stream­line daily tasks, but they should not be con­sidered a cure-all. The quality of the outcomes depends largely on the criteria set in advance and requires careful human oversight. Audiences can quickly detect when they are in­ter­act­ing with a ‘machine’, which can lead to a loss of interest and trust. Therefore, AI tools for social media should always be viewed as a sup­ple­ment­ary aid, rather than a complete solution.

When con­sid­er­ing this principle, AI tech­no­logy is suitable for a wide range of ap­plic­a­tions and in­dus­tries. The size of the company is not a de­term­in­ing factor. Smaller busi­nesses can benefit sig­ni­fic­antly from AI-powered social media tools, as they simplify or even automate tasks that would otherwise require a larger team and budget. These tools assist with defining themes and target audiences, quickly and af­ford­ably creating content, and providing valuable insights through mon­it­or­ing for future op­tim­isa­tion. For larger busi­nesses, AI is es­pe­cially useful for analytics. It also enables better man­age­ment of large-scale in­ter­ac­tions and faster post gen­er­a­tion.