Often the biggest challenge of social media marketing is finding the time to do it. Fortunately there are some great low-cost tools available which can help streamline your activity.
I use Buffer, HootSuite and SocialOomph to automate the more tedious tasks on Twitter, such as content distribution and following back, so I can concentrate on engaging with my followers in real time. Read on to find out how I do it.
Buffer
Visit the website: Buffer
Buffer is an online app that automatically shares your Tweets throughout the day. When you add an update to Buffer itís put in a queue and sent out on a predefined schedule. Buffer’s analytics section lets you see how many people clicked your links or shared your updates with their followers.
How I use Buffer
All the content marketing gurus say we should be curating and sharing valuable content with our followers. Buffer gives me an easy way to do that.
I use the Feedly RSS reader to subscribe to dozens of blogs with content relevant to my audience. Once a month I scan the feeds for items to share. When I see something good, I click the Buffer button in Feedly and it brings up a Tweet with the title of the blog post or article and a link to it.
I simply add my comment and/or hashtag, click another button and the tweet is added to the end of my Buffer queue. This way it takes me around 2 hours to schedule a monthís worth of tweets.
If you install the Buffer bookmarklet on your browser of choice you can also add items of interest to your Buffer as you come across them on the web.
HootSuite
Visit the Website: HootSuite
HootSuite simplifies your social media marketing by letting you manage multiple social networks from one simple dashboard. Message scheduling is one of the most useful features and with HootSuite Pro you can even upload bulk updates from a spreadsheet.
How I use HootSuite
As well as curating other people’s content I also use Twitter to promote my own content. Using HootSuite’s scheduling feature I can schedule a weekís worth of tweets about my own blog posts in about 15 minutes.
Whenever I write a draft of a new blog post in Microsoft Word I also write five tweets about the post in the same document. I have also created a Word document with pre-written tweets about my best evergreen blog posts.
Once the tweet text is written it’s simply a matter of cutting and pasting it into HootSuite and scheduling it to go out over the following week. I like to have one tweet promoting my latest post and one tweet promoting an old post scheduled for each day.
Social Oomph
Visit the Website: Social Oomph
Social Oomph is a social media management tool with many of the same features as HootSuite. For me, SocialOomph’s most useful feature is automated direct messages for new Twitter followers.
How I use SocialOomph
Once you start tweeting and engaging with people the rate at which you get new followers starts to increase. Now if you’re a member of “Team Follow Back” like I am, it can be quite time consuming to thank people for following and follow them back.
SocialOomph solves this problem. You can set it up to automatically follow new followers and send them a nice direct message like: “Thanks for the follow. I look forward to reading your tweets.”
But be aware some people are offended by auto direct messages, no matter how sincere your motives. It’s definitely a good idea to keep them non-promotional. This isnít the place for your sales pitch.
What about you?
Are there any social media tools that make your life easier?
Please share the details in the comments.