If you run a business, having a social media presence is imperative. But how do you automate your social media so it doesn’t rule your life? Being chained to your desk posting content all day isn’t my idea of a fun time.
Now, one of the things that I do really love is creating content. People have always asked me how I have so much to say. Guess when you run a business, it’s a good trait to be talkative? Actually, the best advice my coach told me about creating content was, “Enter the conversation already going on in their head.”
People also stop their scroll when they see something that is a little bit disruptive. Don’t be scared to speak your mind or ruffle some feathers.
I do have some favorites when it comes to social media. I started on Facebook and it remains my favorite place to interact. It could be because I’m comfortable there and I know I how it works. I feel like there’s a community there. I know some people love Instagram, which is the platform I’ve been trying to get into, but just haven’t found a knack for yet. Then of course there’s Linkedin, Twitter and Pinterest. All the social media platforms have their fans and demographics.
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How Do I Schedule My Posts?
I generally put together my posts by reverse engineering the message I want to convey for a target project. The project might be a course or product launch or a free 3 day challenge or online training. For example, I have my Easy Writer Guaranteed Amazon Best Seller program live start for Feb 4, so I’m launching that live session between now and the start date.
In between, I have two free 3-day challenges and a online training. About two weeks prior to the challenges and trainings, my posts’ goal will be to enroll people to those items.
When I’m not promoting the freebies, my posts’ goal will be to create interest in the Easy Writer program and lead people to message me or enroll straight away.
I will map out 90 days of content at a time. Then I reuse entire emails as social media posts or break them up if need be. I’ll use the same message in videos as well — repurpose your content!
Facebook has its own scheduling tools for Pages and Groups
The Facebook algorithm likes it when posts are scheduled within the application, so I use that as much as possible.
For my recurring theme posts in my group, I use an app called amplifr.com which I got for a deal when they first launched. I love that I can use the same post over and over again weekly. This way I can get a whole month’s posts done in about 30 minutes.
Before I used amplifr.com, I used a free tool called tinytorch.com. What I love about tinytorch is that they have already created some great quotes for different categories like inspiration, health, questions, etc. so if you’re short on help, you’ll have pretty graphics without much effort. If you upgrade to the $10 plan, you can create what they call campaigns that would schedule out repeating groups of posts.
Recently I stumbled upon PromoRepublic and it’s replaced my other tools. I love the Post Ideas Feature that I talk about HERE.
Instagram requires human interaction except if you were lucky enough to get a program called grum.co. At last check, they weren’t accepting new users. I am able to post to my instagram from my computer through grum and not have to deal with real-time posting like most do.
Alternatively, I’ve heard that planoly.com is great for scheduling out instagram and seeing how it will look in your feed before you post it. You’ll have to manually post from your phone, but the bonus, I’ve heard is that the spacing (you know that nightmare with the carriage return that doesn’t work well in insta?) actually works when you copy and paste to instagram from planoly.
Instagram also has internal mechanisms to post to Facebook concurrently too.
ifttt.com
Now, because I decided I wanted to have content on Linkedin and Twitter, I decided to repurpose my content from my other platforms. With ifttt.com which stands for If This, Then That, I can spider my content out — and sometimes make it prettier than the internal mechanisms available within the other apps. For example, if I use Instagram to post to Twitter, it won’t post the photo and that’s not pretty! Using ifttt.com, I can post the text and the photo.
Inside ifttt.com, you pick “applets” that serve different functions. Just make sure you double check they work and there you have connected your accounts correctly. Not all applets work well.
You can also use ifttt.com for Pinterest, but I use my blog as below to fill my pinterest.
UPDATE/EDIT: Seems ifttt.com now is used in conjunction with MeetEdgar, so I don’t use it anymore.
Pinterest is filled with my blog
My blog has social media share links to the left hand side. After I’m done writing my blog, I share it out wherever I want. It’s pretty quick. For each photo that I have in my blog, I send the article to my Pinterest.
Blog and podcast scheduled through RSS feed
I assume that most media that offer an RSS feed has a way to automatically post for you. That’s what I’ve found with my blog through wordpress (this one you’re reading) and my podcast through libsyn. I can send to social media accounts by connecting through their internal interface or with a plugin for wordpress. My CRM checks weekly for new content and sends an email to my list if there is. I use ActiveCampaign for my CRM (check the bottom of my blog’s Tool tab to get a 14 day free trial).
And there it is!!! If you need help scheduling out your social media, check out ACADIUM to get your own personal intern.
I’d love to hear what you’ll be implementing in your business in the comments below.
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Vickie Gould is a book coach, best selling author, and speaker. She believes that everyone has a story to share and a journey orchestrated for their positive growth — and that those experiences should be written in a best selling book.
Vickie helps entrepreneurs to write, self-publish and leverage their own business books to share those stories, grow their following, create more impact and turn readers into clients through her Easy Writer Program, one-on-one coaching and her free Facebook Group, Write Your Biz Book.
She has written 10 best sellers such as Easy Writer (named after her signature program) and Standing in the Gap, and helped nearly 100 others to become best selling authors as well. Get her cheatsheet called 5 Secret Strategies to Write Your Book Quickly at: bit.ly/5secretstrategies.
I was able to find good advice from your blog articles.|