Mention social media to any small business owner and you’re likely to see folks cringe or you’ll hear a few groans. You’ve probably read a million articles and enough tips to make your head spin and still feel like you’re never doing “enough” for your business on social media. I get it. It’s not that you hate social media. It’s that you hate the fact that you have to find time in your already hectic schedule for it.
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Social media for personal use is ten times easier because you do what you want (if anything). But social for business? It’s overwhelming and if not done strategically and intentionally, it can also be a huge time suck. There’s no two ways about it. But for just about every industry/niche, it’s necessary. Why?
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Social (when done right) can yield enormous benefits – turning members of your online communities to leads and ultimately, to customers because it operates like word-of-mouth, amplified.
So just how do time-starved entrepreneurs and small business owners carve out a space for themselves on social media? Here are a few tips and tools I’ve found to be helpful and that help take the guesswork out of sharing, posting and interacting with your online communities.
Subscribe and Scan
Any serious entrepreneur ought to be reading about or watching the latest developments and trends in their respective industries.
Take the headache out of aggregating all of that content online by creating your own virtual library (or magazine rack), with tools like Feedly.
A wildly popular free web-based and mobile app, Feedly allows users to subscribe to and aggregate all of their favorite sources anywhere on the web all in one place. So, that means: no more scrolling through bookmarks. No more typing the URLs of your favorite websites into your browser to see what the latest content is. No more fear of missing out on important updates and developments.
Feedly works off of RSS, so the content from your favorite sites is updated constantly and it acts as a content discovery site, recommending related content and websites similar to the sites you already subscribed to.
A small business owner’s day shouldn’t get eaten up with mindless social media and internet surfing. But part of your day should be devoted to finding a way to consistently show up on social media to engage your followers and share interesting, helpful content.
That’s why after you’ve successfully aggregated your favorite sources, you should take some time to scan them daily for any relevant or interesting updates you think your online community would appreciate or find helpful.
The important thing to remember about building a community, especially one full of engaged people using social media is that it will not happen overnight. That’s why it’s important to remain consistent. And consistency only happens when you make small investments each day.
Schedule and Share
After you’ve gotten your virtual content library together and have scanned the latest updates, now’s the time to schedule and share that content you’ve either curated or created yourself with your online community.
Making small investments to build and maintain a consistent social presence doesn’t mean you have to spend 24 hours a day connected to a device.
No time to manually Tweet or Facebook key updates?
Thankfully there are apps for that. A few of my favorites are Buffer and Hootsuite. These free social media management tools allow you to share your content across all your major social platforms (Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn) – in one place, in advance, on your own schedule and even while you’re asleep.
In addition to allowing you to schedule and queue updates, some great things about Buffer are the app also suggests great content for you to share  from a variety of topics (taking much of the guesswork out). The app also provides analytics, letting you know how your status updates and content sharing are working.
Hootsuite is great because the dashboard allows you to access the various feeds and streams from your social channels without having to manually log into each of them to see what other folks are updating. And just like Buffer, Hootsuite provides analytics and insights into how your updates are faring across social media.
But don’t just
solely rely on automated social updates to build a consistent social presence for your business. Although it’s helpful, it’s important to take some time each day to do what I like to call “social listening”: responding to feedback and social mentions, and being there to share content right when it’s relevant. Carving out even just 30 minutes a day to do this will, without a doubt, render you more ROI by helping you nurture more relationships.Social media will no longer be an overwhelming rabbit hole  if you use these tips and tools, which ultimately will help increase others’ awareness of your business, help you build a quality following and allow you to turn more leads into customers.
Courtney Herring is the founder of The Champ Media Agency and a consulting entreproducer dedicated to helping time-starved entrepreneurs execute their content strategy to nurture inspired and engaged online communities by taking the headache out of editing, social media, and Web content maintenance, allowing clients to be successful in other pursuits. You can follow her on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.