Six Strategic Social Media Tips When You Are Too Busy
Don’t Have Time to Post? Here are Six Strategic Tips for Keeping Up with Your Social Media Responsibilities
Someone once said, “time is short,” and in this day and age of balancing a home family life, business duties and perhaps taking on second or third jobs, that phrase has become something of a gross understatement. Into this mix has come social media, which everyone seemed to, at one point, have gobs of time for, yet the paradigm in this area has changed significantly as well, what with busy people finding themselves with fewer opportunities to check in on his or her Facebook page.
The situation is profoundly complicated when it comes to uber-busy business owners who cannot seem to find a moment to keep up with the ever-running social media scene. Case in point: Somewhere around 6,000 tweets are sent, people upload about 800 photos on Instagram, and five new profiles are added to Facebook every second.
Someone once said, “time is short,” and in this day and age of balancing a home family life, business duties and perhaps taking on second or third jobs, that phrase has become something of a gross understatement. Into this mix has come social media, which everyone seemed to, at one point, have gobs of time for, yet the paradigm in this area has changed significantly as well, what with busy people finding themselves with fewer opportunities to check in on his or her Facebook page.
The situation is profoundly complicated when it comes to uber-busy business owners who cannot seem to find a moment to keep up with the ever-running social media scene. Case in point: Somewhere around 6,000 tweets are sent, people upload about 800 photos on Instagram, and five new profiles are added to Facebook every second.
The point here is that life on the Internet – and in the social media world – moves at a lightning pace, and if you are a business owner who spends the day meeting with prospective clients, gutting out old floors for an office remodel or driving to and from job sites, it’s pretty darn hard to keep up with all your interests that may be on these social platforms. Hard…but not impossible. With some simple “adjustments,” you can bolster your engagement, land more project leads and keep yourself stocked with relevant posts…all without a massive time commitment on your behalf.
1. Share Other Posts
There’s a reason the “share” button is on social media pages, and you should not hesitate to use it, especially when busy. Sharing or retweeting posts lets you build up your feed quickly with little effort. However, be warned: If you are continually retweeting or sharing others’ content, it can come across like you are not contributing any of your own finds, so don’t exclusively share content all the time, as it can reflect negatively on your business’ social media reputation.
2. Stay Ahead of the Game
“Planning makes all the difference.” That is something the best strategists always say. What does that mean for you? Developing both a social media plan and having a fallback when spare time is harder to come by. Social media scheduling apps come in handy here, such as Buffer or Amplifr, which connect to all your accounts, allowing you to designate posts for future dates. Double-booked for a job? This one action should save you time when this happens.
3. Harness the Power of Automation
We mentioned social media scheduling, but in addition to this, you can use some “creative computing” to help get more content to your feed. Consider “IFTTT,” which stands for “If This, Then That,” an automation “applet” that integrates with social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and which can be used to program your own automated “rules” for your applications (for instance, to schedule a link to be posted every time you “favorite it” as you browse).
4. Don’t Disregard Analytics
Many scheduling apps contain analytics reports which you can make use of to review each post’s success rate and see what kind of content your audience responds to. Here’s what’s essential: Pull reports on engagement, clicks, likes, and shares at least once a month and review this data to see what brings your followers out of the woodwork, while also developing a plan to integrate the kind of content your users seem to respond to.
5. Do Not Engage in Customer Complaints
We understand that the balance of social media presence and running your day-to-day operations can get daunting, but if you are putting off posting or delaying your customer responses, it can have serious repercussions – and we do not want that to happen to you. Cut out a few moments each day to “triage” customer complaints and engage with users who connect with you via social media. Here’s a vital tip: Never argue with an angry or frustrated customer; on the contrary, thank them, and offer to make it right. Even if you disagree with them – and we know how frustrating this can be when you are sure you are right – it will diffuse the situation, and more than likely save your reputation.
6. Hire Someone
If all else fails and you find yourself continually struggling to keep up with customers and refresh your feed, you can always turn to outside help by hiring a social media agency. With literally hundreds of social media pros ready to take on a gig managing your feed, you will be in good hands, almost no matter whom you pick.
Keeping up with the latest social media posts can be time-consuming, to say the least, for a busy business owner, but these tips above should be just the thing to take the stress away.
1. Share Other Posts
There’s a reason the “share” button is on social media pages, and you should not hesitate to use it, especially when busy. Sharing or retweeting posts lets you build up your feed quickly with little effort. However, be warned: If you are continually retweeting or sharing others’ content, it can come across like you are not contributing any of your own finds, so don’t exclusively share content all the time, as it can reflect negatively on your business’ social media reputation.
2. Stay Ahead of the Game
“Planning makes all the difference.” That is something the best strategists always say. What does that mean for you? Developing both a social media plan and having a fallback when spare time is harder to come by. Social media scheduling apps come in handy here, such as Buffer or Amplifr, which connect to all your accounts, allowing you to designate posts for future dates. Double-booked for a job? This one action should save you time when this happens.
3. Harness the Power of Automation
We mentioned social media scheduling, but in addition to this, you can use some “creative computing” to help get more content to your feed. Consider “IFTTT,” which stands for “If This, Then That,” an automation “applet” that integrates with social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and which can be used to program your own automated “rules” for your applications (for instance, to schedule a link to be posted every time you “favorite it” as you browse).
4. Don’t Disregard Analytics
Many scheduling apps contain analytics reports which you can make use of to review each post’s success rate and see what kind of content your audience responds to. Here’s what’s essential: Pull reports on engagement, clicks, likes, and shares at least once a month and review this data to see what brings your followers out of the woodwork, while also developing a plan to integrate the kind of content your users seem to respond to.
5. Do Not Engage in Customer Complaints
We understand that the balance of social media presence and running your day-to-day operations can get daunting, but if you are putting off posting or delaying your customer responses, it can have serious repercussions – and we do not want that to happen to you. Cut out a few moments each day to “triage” customer complaints and engage with users who connect with you via social media. Here’s a vital tip: Never argue with an angry or frustrated customer; on the contrary, thank them, and offer to make it right. Even if you disagree with them – and we know how frustrating this can be when you are sure you are right – it will diffuse the situation, and more than likely save your reputation.
6. Hire Someone
If all else fails and you find yourself continually struggling to keep up with customers and refresh your feed, you can always turn to outside help by hiring a social media agency. With literally hundreds of social media pros ready to take on a gig managing your feed, you will be in good hands, almost no matter whom you pick.
Keeping up with the latest social media posts can be time-consuming, to say the least, for a busy business owner, but these tips above should be just the thing to take the stress away.
About the Author
Craig Corbel is the VP of Marketing at Solution Web Designs, a lead web design and online marketing firm in New York.
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