Tips For Successful Social Media Time Management

This blog post is part of the Social Media for Small Businesses series

Thanks to all of your comments on the first post of this series – I quickly found the social media issues that really matter to small businesses. The first, unsurprisingly enough, is time management.

Kiwano Tip #2: Time Management

After all the running around that comes with owning your own business (trust us, we’ve known plenty of running in the past few months), how does one have the time to build relationships online? What’s more, how does one efficiently make every moment of their social media investment count?

This is a tough question to answer, especially for a social media enthusiast like myself. I used to happily glue myself to twitter all day, and was guilty of being one of those people checking their iPhone every two minutes. However, as Kiwano Marketing grows increasingly hectic, I’ve come to realize that – obviously – there needs to be a balance for professionals using social media to promote businesses. So, how do you do it?

Content: No “Feeding The Cat” Mentality

The first logical place to assess your time management is by asking yourself: are you doing too much social media? Just as some users have been criticized for taking twitter’s “what are you doing?” to a purely literal level (i.e., ‘feeding my cat’), so too can companies forget their purpose amidst self-promotion. Instead spending time only broadcasting your message, remember the focus: online reputation and quality of content.

Do you really need to be sending out links that few will actually click on, such as ‘go to our website NOW’? Of course not, but this is a common mistake that I’ve seen businesses make online. Give your feeds a break and utilize the time in developing a few relevant, innovative and quirky one-liners that will leave audiences hungry for more.

Note: The common assumption is that oversaturation happens mostly on twitter. Not true; for example, most of the discussion boards on my LinkedIn groups are filled with company promotions and irrelevant questions or blog posts. Annoying to potential customers and partners? Probably.

Interactions That Count

Make sure your social media interactions help, not hinder, your online business development. Angela Maier’s Twitter Engagement Formula is a good place to start when you’re trying to figure out how to effectively connect with others. Keep in mind, however, that every industry is different. Every person is different. It’s up to you to judge and make adjustments to your social media interaction, and find the balance that works for you (and your schedule).

What you should keep in mind, however, is that building trust through your social media connections isn’t as easy as amassing readers who are going to hang onto your every typed character. Just as with a face-to-face meeting, people don’t want to hear too much about your business – at least, at first. They would prefer to know about your personal character, whether or not they should trust you, and how you can help them. This can be ten times as hard as in real life, where you don’t have your charming physical self to stand behind your business. Or, for others, it can be easier to generate lasting relationships – I’ve found that people are much more open to meeting you once they’ve had a chance to scope out your website or twitter feed.

All in all, relationship building is not a place to cut down on when assessing your social media time. You need to make sure the people you’re interacting with are going to eventually help your business (just as you will help theirs), but definitely make the commitment to find and build solid professional contacts.

The Final Word: Do Shiny Gadgets Actually Help?

Here is, by far, the biggest dilemma I’ve encountered in social media time management – do you need the latest iPhone, Blackberry, or other flashy cell phone gadget, in order to be successful? Well, it really comes down to on the kind of person you are and the type of small business you are running.

I think that having a much-desired ‘gadget’ can make it easier for social media, especially if you’re away from a computer or rely on building those online relationships for business. It’s an updater, an icebreaker, and a people-finder all in one (at networking events, for example).

On the other hand, the ‘always on’ status of these fancy cell phones can also contribute to an overall inefficiency of time management. Not having one that you constantly check means that you’re less susceptible to ignoring the viable individuals around you as you go through your day. In fact, I wonder why we don’t give Blackberry power users a harder time. How much tweeting should you do during networking events? None: if you’re actually busy networking.

Know when to turn it off and limit your need to constantly check your social media apps. Good old-fashioned networking could be sitting at the next table over.

Next week, we’ll take a more in-depth look at the specific tools that can help your company’s efficiency on social media. As always, give me a shout at cecilia@kiwano.ca or leave a comment below, and I’ll be happy to take your suggestions and feedback to create more social media tips from Kiwano Marketing.