Holt used to be the editor of Rolling Stone , which is a pretty good gig now and was a great one when he did it in the 1990s. “When I compare my job then to what editors do now, it’s as if all we did was sit around in a tweed jacket, suck on a pipe, and think about music,” he remembers. “Editors now have the insane time pressures, fewer resources, and a news cycle that’s changed entirely. Plus, there’s the threat to print, the recession, and all the trends on the advertising side…
Many of us can relate to time pressure. Especially with Social Media becoming the newest way to market. It can be hard to keep up with the fast-paced trend changes and continue to get work done. We have established that Social Media is not free because time is money. Social media also takes time management and a plan for purposeful execution. Let’s take a look at 4 different ways to manage your time and move forward in Social Media.
1.) Get a social media management tool. Subscribe to Hootsuite, Tweetdeck, or SocialOomph. These are extremely helpful tools because they allow you to manage and post content on more than one social platform at the same time. These management apps also allow you to schedule your content ahead. Because of this automation feature, these tools can help you use your time. They also allow you to create an active online presence without hanging out on Twitter or Facebook all day.
2.) Make, use, and learn from valuable connections. Begin this process with a list of people that you follow who are providing valuable content. Create a rotation and then choose 2 or 3 blogs to read and comment on each day, or if this is still too much find a limit that works for you. Making and sticking to this commitment will help you keep track of your time, but keep you proactive in the social media world. You are learning and instantly making connections. Their input is fuel for your own personal growth and knowledge, and their ideas may inspire yours.
3.) Repurpose your content. There are times when business is booming, and there is not enough time for edgy new content to be produced. A huge time and energy saver is to learn how to repurpose the wealth of knowledge that you have already produced for white papers or case studies, marketing or training materials. Consider using the subject of an old blog post as a basis for a blog series. Give your content the It-Factor.
4.) Use tools to help you find content
Finding content to post can be difficult and time consuming. There may not be enough time for you to check your Twitter lists for great content, especially if you have a particular subject that you’d like to share. Google alerts, Twitter Search, Kurrently.com are all examples of tools that help you find specific content that you would want to post. Google alerts allows you to type in a keyword and then sends you an email when any content with that word in it is put on the web. It searches for you.
Twitter search and Kurrently are tools that search Twitter and Facebook when you type in keywords. Anyone that has tweeted, or posted with that word or hashtag (#) symbol will show up in the search. If you know what you’re looking for, this can save you a lot of time.
Time management is important to do, but habits can be hard to develop. Do you have other tricks or methods that you use to help you manage your time for social media?
