Seven out of ten consumers are more likely to use a local business if it has information available on a social media site, according to a comScore survey. After you have set up your social media accounts, it’s equally important to develop a social media management plan that works for your business’s timeline. Organizing your social networks and executing a plan will save you both time and money, which in return will allow you to invest your timeinto other aspects of the business. Want to learn how to effectively manage social media for business? Here are 5 tips for effective social media management.
5 Social Media Management Tips For Small Businesses
Tip #1: Get yourself organized
Choose a social media management tool that can help you monitor all your social networks from one place. This is where the Hootsuite dashboard comes into play. With the the Hootsuite dashboard, you can integrate the most popular social networks—Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+—along with the option of adding well-known applications such as Instagram, YouTube and Mail Chimp (to name a few) to your dashboard. Once you get yourself set up, the Hootsuite dashboard becomes your one stop shop for your social media management. Not only can you cross-network post but you can monitor all of your messaging in one place.
Tip #2: Content is King!
Once you have your Hootsuite dashboard set up, where do you go next? A best practice for any Social Media Manager is to create a content calendar. For example, If your goal is to post 5 times a day, know what type of content each post will be: it can consist of three posts from relevant websites, one piece of original content from your blog, and one promoting your product(s). To take this further, here’s a beginner’s guide to content curation to learn more about providing quality content to your customers.
Tip #3: Build a social media army
Social Media Management is no longer a one-man job, it’s a team effort. Whether it’s the intern, a co-worker, or client, there is almost always someone you can collaborate with and the Hootsuite dashboard is designed to help you do this. What happens when you take a vacation? While the Hootsuite dashboard offers enhanced scheduling capabilities, social media management doesn’t go on vacation. Often times it is comforting to know there is someone monitoring your networks and messaging while you are away. Thanks to the teams feature on the Hootsuite dashboard, you can invite trusted individuals to join you in an internal organization to collaborate and manage your social networks together.
Tip #4: Get ahead with scheduling
Social media does not sleep, so how do you manage it when you need a snooze? Take control of your social media management and save time with Hootsuite. Features like the scheduler allow you to be present on social media when you’re not in front of a screen. Composing time-sensitive content such as an urgent news update or retweet? Take advantage of the calendar scheduler where you can pick and choose the date and time of when you want your content published.
Alternatively, leave the scheduling up to Hootsuite’s Auto Scheduler, which uses an algorithm to send your content out for optimal impact. Ramping up for a campaign? For all Hootsuite Pro users, you have the ability to schedule up to 350 messages at once using the Bulk Message Uploader. Whatever your preference may be, the ability to schedule content in advance will allow you to manage your social messaging in real time, and connect you with the conversations that are valuable to your business.
Tip #5: Dedicate 10 mins each day to social media
In order to effectively manage your social media, successful businesses set aside time each day to do so. What this means is dedicating even just 10 mins a day to sending out content, engaging and monitoring conversations and evaluating your successes. These 10mins can make your social media presence that much better, therefore improving your online reputation.