Whether you’re fairly new to social media or consider yourself an ‘old hat’, here are some little-known social media features you’ve probably never heard of. The secret’s out…

1. Free Twitter cards

No doubt you’ve probably spotted promoted Twitter cards? Well, did you know that you can create them for free? You will, however, first need to sign up to Twitter adverts to access them. Once you’ve signed up, you can access the platform at any time through your Twitter profile on desktop. Just click on your little profile picture and choose Twitter Ads from the drop down menu, as pictured below.

From the Twitter adverts dashboard, click on Creatives and then Cards (as pictured below).

Click on Create Lead Generation Card in the top right-hand corner and you’re ready to start creating. Once you are in the editing tool, you can choose the objective of your card: lead generation, website clicks, basic app or image app. Creating the card is really straight forward and you will be able to preview it before tweeting. Once you’ve created a card, you can use it again and again. You will find all your Twitter Cards under the Creatives > Cards page. To use them again, just click on the ‘create tweet icon’ (a square with a feather), as pictured below and add in your copy to accompany the card.

And here’s what they look like in a Twitter timeline:

2. Instant Facebook stats

Facebook Insights are great but did you know you can instantly see a snapshot of how well a post has performed? You need to be a Page Admin to access this feature and it’s really useful if you want to send a visual snapshot to your manager or team to show how well a particular post has performed. Below your post is a bar (highlighted below with a blue box) telling you how many people your post has reached.

When you click on it, you will see detailed stats relating to that post such as how many people liked the post on your Page and how many liked the post from shares, how many comments it’s had and how many link clicks.

3. Repost Instagram photos

Unlike Twitter, where you can retweet a supporter’s tweet, Instagram has no inbuilt function to repost or regram a supporter’s photo or video. Luckily there are a host of apps that can let you do this. Instarepost is available for both iOS and Android and it attributes the original owner’s Instagram name and profile picture. If you’re running an event or campaign with a hashtag, this is a perfect way of recognising and sharing your supporter’s Instagram photos and videos.

Have you got a little-known social media feature to share? Comment below!