To have an automated process of sharing your newly published Wordpress blog posts on your social media accounts.
You will be able to automatically share a new blog post across all your social platforms once you publish it, save time and keep your audience engaged.
- It is recommended, not mandatory, to have the WordPress Yoast SEO plugin installed to your website. If you don’t know how to do this, check out this SOP 008 (web version).
- You need to have at least one blog post published on your website.
You need to have a streamlined process for sharing your blog posts regularly. When you automate this process, you save a lot of time and increase your social presence and consistency.
Wordpress, Zapier, Buffer and your social media accounts.
You only need to do this once per one social media account. After this, your new blog posts will be automatically shared across that account. You will need to repeat this process if you want to share your blog posts on more social media platforms.
You do it (or your social or content manager.)
Environment setup
- Set up a free Zapier account.
- Make sure you are connected to your company’s social accounts.
- Optional, get a Buffer account with access to your company’s social accounts. If you want to learn how to set up your Buffer account, check out this SOP 023 (web version).
Set up an automated blog post sharing process
To automate blog post sharing you have two options, and this SOP will explain both of them to you.
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Option #1 is for people who want the blog posts published directly to their social media accounts. Choosing this option means that, after you set up the process, your blog post will be shared in social media immediately after it is published.
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Option #2 will add your blog post to your social media publishing queue in Buffer. Your post will not be shared immediately after your published it, it will be shared in the usual schedule for social media posting. Yes, this is the option for you if you are a night owl who absolutely needs to write about wallpaper choices at 3 A.M. on Saturday, but doesn’t want to let people know about their lack of a social life.
We will start with Option #1. Feel free to scroll down for Option #2.
Option #1: Sharing your posts directly on the social media channel.
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Log in to your Zapier account.
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Click on “Make a zap”.
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Name your zap. It should be something easy to remember and self-explanatory, something like “Share New Posts To [Name of the Social Media Account]. We will name ours “Share New Posts Twitter”.
4. Now you will set up a trigger for your zap.
Type “Wordpress” in the search box of trigger apps and click on it.
Choose “New Post” trigger from the list of Wordpress triggers, as shown below, then click “Save + Continue”.
5. You will be asked to connect your Wordpress account next, then click “Save + Continue”.
6. Edit your setup options, as shown below, then click “Continue”.
Post status should be “Published”
Post type should be “Posts”.
Click “Fetch and continue” to test your trigger. You need to have at least one published post in your Wordpress site for the test to work.
7. Now it’s time to set up an action. For this exercise we will use Twitter.
Choose your action app by typing its name in the search box.
Choose your action type, then click “Save + Continue”. In this case, it will be “Create Tweet”.
Connect your social media account to Zapier, then click “Save + Continue”.
8. Set up the template for the post.
In your message field, write the message you want to share on social media along with your blog post. E.g. “Check out my new post about [Post Title] at [Post Link].
Select “[Post Title]” and then click on the small icon in the right of the field to see a list of variables. Choose “Post Title” from the list.
Do the same for “[Post Link]”
9. Test to check if everything is fine.
See if the message looks ok.
Click “Send test to” (in our case its “Send test to Twitter”) to publish the post immediately and see how it looks.
Go to your social account to verify that the post was published correctly.
If everything looks ok, click “Continue” and then turn on your Zap.
That’s it. You can repeat this process for Facebook, LinkedIn or any social media platform you are using. All you have to do is simply add your desired social account as the “action app”.
Ok, it’s Option #2 time now, which means that you will learn how to add your posts to your schedule via Buffer. For this exercise we will set up an automated tweet.
10. Log in to your Zapier account.
11. Click on “Make a Zap”.
12. Name your Zap. It should be something easy to remember and self-explanatory, something like “Share New Posts To [Name of the Social Media Account] via Buffer. We will name ours “Share New Posts via Buffer”.
13. Now you will set up a trigger for your zap.
Type “Wordpress” in the search box of trigger apps and click on it.
Choose “New Post” trigger from the list of Wordpress triggers, as shown below, then click “Save + Continue”.
14. You will be asked to connect your Wordpress account next, which is exactly what you should do if you don’t want to suffer the wrath, then click “Save + Continue”.
15. Edit your setup options, as shown below, then click “Continue”.
Post status should be “Published”
Post type should be “Posts”.
Click “Fetch and continue” to test your trigger. You need to have at least one published posts in your Wordpress for the test to work.
16. Now you will set up the action.
Choose Buffer by typing its name in the search box.
Choose the action “Add to Buffer”.
17. Connect your Buffer account and authorize Zapier.
18. Set up your template:
For “Profile” choose the social media account you want to post to.
In the “Text” box, write the message you want to share on social media along with your blog post. E.g. “Check out my new post about [Post Title] at [Post Link]”.
Select “[Post Title]” and then click on the small icon in the right of the field to see a list of variables. Choose “Post Title” from the list.
Do the same for “[Post Link]”
Optional - You can add a photo to the post by specifying its URL in the box. You can also add the variable called “Custom Field Yoast Wpseo Opengraph Image” but this will only work if your have Yoast SEO plugin installed to your Wordpress.
Optional - If you want this post to be on the top of the Buffer queue, set it to “Yes”.
Optional - If you want to send the post immediately, set the option to “Yes”, then click “Continue”.
19. Last, but not least, you will test your zap.
- See if the message looks ok.
- Click “Send test to Buffer” to add the post immediately in Buffer
- Go to Buffer to verify that the post was published correctly.
And you’re done. You can repeat this process for Facebook, LinkedIn or any social media account that is connected to your Buffer account. All you have to do is simply add your desired social account as the “action template”.