7 Social Media Time Savers

There’s no two ways about it, social media marketing is time consuming – if done properly. However, if you read and apply the seven tips I’ve provided in this article, you’ll feel like Dr. Who (apparently he’s the ‘Time Lord’).

The Excuses Reasons

Some excuses as to why people don’t have time to market their business through social media are entirely valid, but only some. The majority of excuses are, in fact, products of laziness and a lack of creativity. The good news is you’re about to get the answers to both sets of excuses.

I understand fully that some are trying to start/run a business along-side running a family or working a 9 till 5. Purely fitting in the time to service clients can be difficult, but it can be done. Pretty much all other excuses don’t merit a mention. Don’t be lazy is all I can say.

One health warning I’ll give straight off the bat is: rushed social media marketing can be detrimental to your business and reputation.

So to the 7 Tips

A few of these may seem like common sense to a lot of you, but guess what: common sense aint that common. Remember that.

1. Create a Post Planner

Your post planner should be linked to the decisions you made in your monthly strategy. This can be as simple as a spread sheet with the days of the week on it, and then under the days the types of posts you intend on creating that day. For example:

Monday: 1. Motivational video, 2. Post monthly offer.

Tuesday: 1. Engaging question, 2. Staff/location picture, 3. Upcoming events.

Wednesday: 1. Expert article – And so on…

You get the picture.

A good rule of thumb is 2 – 3 posts per day. You don’t want to flood your audience’s News Feed, and want to give each post time to be affective.

2. Use Scheduled Posts

Scheduled posts are awesome; purely and simply. It is a very simple tool that Facebook provides, and for other channels such as Twitter, I advise hootsuit.com.

Set your posts up for the day and they’ll be released at the times you have set. Bingo.

Facebook Scheduling

3. Use Pinterest or Evernote

Everyone should have somewhere to store inspiration at all times. As I carry my phone with me 90% of the day, I use Evernote – a great app that allows you to store notes, voice notes, web-links and images. Pinterest, if you don’t already know, is great for storing useful web-links etc.

This stored data can then be reviewed when it comes to creating content for your social media channels.

4. Time Block

Time blocking is simple, so I’ll keep this explanation short.

Block off a time period when you’ll work on a selected task, and turn off all distractions during this time (phones, internet etc.). You must only focus on this task and nothing can interfere with this time period.

Here is a useful link I posted on Facebook recently which explains time blocking perfectly:

http://www.wikihow.com/Time-Block

5. Link Facebook with Twitter with LinkedIn

By linking up your social media channels, anything you post on Facebook will be repeated on Twitter, and Twitter with LinkedIn etc.

I do warn you however, do not solely release content on one channel and neglect the others. This reeks of laziness. The types of content required for each channel varies. Treat Twitter like a bar, Facebook like your lounge and LinkedIn like a conference room.

6. Sleep Less

This can be nicely described using a famous quote by a hero of mine – Arnold Schwarzenegger:

“There’s 24 hours in a day. You sleep for 6 hours and you have 18 left. Some of you out there say ‘well, I sleep 8 hours or 9 hours’. Well then, just sleep faster!”

Due to my current business/life situation I have to get up at 6am every morning in order to get things done. And before a busy day it might be 5.30am; whatever it takes.

7. Stay Healthy & Exercise

A good diet coupled with regular exercise increases concentration and your ability to learn. With a poor diet and a lack of exercise, 1.You run the risk of feeling sluggish and 2. your brain will not work at its optimal performance.

For those who are interested this is why exercise helps your brain:

1. As you exercise, your muscles contract.

2. This releases chemicals, including a protein called IGF-1.

3. IGF-1 travels to the brain and stimulates the release of several chemicals, including brain derived neurotropic factor (BDNF).

4. Regular exercise increases levels of BDNF.

5. BDNF stimulates neurons (brain cells) to branch and connect in new ways.

6. New junctions between neurons are the basis of learning.

And that’s that.

To Wrap it Up

There is never really an excuse for why something can’t be done. Sometimes sacrifices have to be made in order to achieve a goal.

Hopefully this article has given you some actions to take away and add in to your daily routine. If there is anything you’d like to discuss further then leave a comment bellow, or on Facebook, Twitter, Google +… where ever suits you best. All of the links are below:

F: https://www.facebook.com/DreamtheatreLimited

T: https://twitter.com/DreamtheatreUK 

G: https://plus.google.com/u/0/103777485746000148812/posts

www.dreamtheatremarketing.com