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Scheduling Facebook posts is a useful tactic you can employ on your profile or brand page.
- Stay on top of your content calendar by scheduling posts on Facebook ahead of time.
- You can schedule posts on Facebook from a desktop computer or the Facebook Pages Manager app in a few steps.
- Third-party programs like Hootsuite can also help you schedule posts and stay organized.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Creating a content calendar for your Facebook brand page can help you create a consistent voice and posting schedule. And lining up your posts ahead of time will save you the stress of needing to post in the moment every day (with the exception of timely or otherwise unique posts).
You can schedule your posts both on the Facebook app and other third-party services, like Hootsuite. You can easily keep track of what you schedule, and edit things as you might need in the future.
Here's how to schedule a post on your Facebook page, a few different ways.
How to schedule a Facebook post on desktop
1. On desktop, start writing your status or share a photo or link as you normally would. Before you hit "Share Now," however, move your cursor instead to the small arrow next to "Share Now" underneath "News Feed."
2. You will see a drop-down menu with a few options. Select "Schedule."
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Click the smaller "Share Now" button to open a dropdown menu.
3. A pop-up calendar lets you choose your specific date and time for the post to go out.
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Choose when you want your post to go out.
4. Once you indicate the date and time, hit "Schedule." Your post will then look like this. Notice the "Later," meaning this post won't go up right away. That signals that you scheduled it successfully. Just be sure to hit "Schedule Post" to finalize everything.
Eva Recinos/Business Insider The "Share Now" buttons will be changed to reflect the scheduling.
On your main page, you should be able to see "1 Scheduled Post," or try refreshing your page. Click on "See post" for more details.
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Click "See post" or "See posts" to check on all the posts you've scheduled.
You can now see your upcoming scheduled posts in one place. From here, you can keep track of everything, and also edit or delete posts that you've scheduled.
How to schedule Facebook posts on mobile
When working from mobile, you can use Facebook Pages Manager to schedule a post.
1. Open the app and hit the "Publish" button.
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Tap "Publish."
2. Write your status and add any links or media. Tap "Continue."
3. Tap on "When will this be published?"
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Tap the top "When will this be published?" tab.
4. From here, you can choose to schedule the post by hitting "Schedule Later." The blue check mark should be on that field. You'll get a scroll-through menu where you can choose the date and time for the post to go live.
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Pick when you want the post to go up.
5. Once you click "Done," the next screen will look similar to the screen before the date and time menu. This time, however, the "When will this be published?" field will read "Scheduled for later." Hit "Schedule" to finish.
Your post will now be scheduled to go up at the selected date and time. Note that when you schedule something on the Facebook Pages app you should be able to see it in desktop under your list of scheduled posts. This makes it easy to keep track of everything in one place.
How to schedule Facebook posts using third-party posting services
You can also use third-party services and programs like Hootsuite to schedule your Facebook posts.
1. Once you have connected your social channels to the service, simply create a new post. Make sure that you select the exact page you want the post to be published on (under the "Post to" section).
2. Once you finish typing your status and adding any media, select "Schedule for Later."
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Compose your post and click "Schedule for later."
3. You'll get a calendar option where you can choose the date and time for the post to go live. Once everything looks good, hit "Schedule." You should now be able to see this post under the "Planner" tab on the corresponding date and time it will go up.
Eva Recinos/Business Insider Decide when you want your post to go up.
If you ever want to unschedule a post, you can always save it as a draft and keep it for later. Or you can easily change the date and time on an already scheduled post to shift your content calendar just slightly. These tools make it easy to keep track of your content throughout your busy days.
Related coverage from How To Do Everything: Tech:
How to create a Facebook business page for your company, brand, or community
How to add an admin to your Facebook page, and manage your page roles
How to see who is following your Facebook profile or page
How to create an event on Facebook for your brand page or personal profile
