Y’all know Buffer? It’s a fairly sophisticated app for posting to social media. It began, I believe, as just a way to schedule tweets. Then it became a way to craft social media posts but send them to more than just Twitter: Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc. That, to me, is still the core value. If you have accounts on all those, it’s too much rote work trying to cross-post yourself.

Chris Enns the other day (in our ShopTalk Discord) noted that:

1. Micro.blog can do cross-posting too (shown off in this video at this time stamp).
2. They are having a sale where it’s just $1/month (for 4 months then it’s $5)

What seemed notable to me was how different the group of sites to cross-post are, so I documented it quick:

| Buffer | Micro.blog | | Twitter | ✅ They say it’s fine, and I basically trust Buffer, but I have zero trust in Twitter. | ☯️ For now, the video a few days ago said it would be removed in coming months. | | Facebook | ✅ | ❌ | | Mastodon | ✅ | ✅ | | Bluesky | ❌ | ✅ Nice, way to be on it. | | LinkedIn | ✅ | ✅ | | Flickr | ❌ | ✅ | | Pinterest | ✅ | ❌ | | Tumblr | ❌ | ✅ | | Medium | ❌ | ✅ | | TikTok | ✅ | ❌ | | YouTube | ☯️ Coming soon, they say. | ❌ | | Instagram | ✅ | ❌ | | Shopify | ✅ | ❌ | | Google Business Profile | ✅ | ❌ |

So there are:

• Four sites that Micro.blog can do that Buffer can’t: Bluesky, Flickr, Tumblr, and Medium.
• Six sites that Buffer can do that Micro.blog can’t: Facebook, Pinterest, TikTok, Instagram, Shopify, Google Business

I was particularly interested in how Micro.blog could do Bluesky, because that seems hotly up-and-coming and CodePen has an account there now. And Micro.blog is so affordable! Buffer can be a bit expensive with a team and multiple channels. Maybe I’ll switch? But no, probably not, I really like that Buffer can do Instagram — so I gotta stick with that for now probably.

What I didn’t do here, obviously, is look at other apps out there that can do cross-posting. I literally have no idea who else is doing it. I should probably have a look around.