Effective Social Media Management
for Small Business
Managing social media for small business can feel like one more thing on your already full plate, but it doesn’t have to. Small business owners know that in order to keep their business relevant, they must be active on social media. But there has to be an easier way! That is why many small business leaders use tools for social media management.
What are social media management tools?
Social media management tools assist in creating content, scheduling that content and then analyzing the performance of that content. Perhaps the most effective social media tool for marketing is a social media scheduler. A social media scheduler is extremely effective for small businesses owners because it allows them to create content ahead of time and schedule it to go out on all of that businesses social media channels at their desired date and time. Furthermore, social media management software can also assist in the creation of content. It does this by the user inputting the topic, tone of voice, purpose and some talking points to include and generates copy off of that. (We have found writing your own copy and scheduling it ahead of time to be most effective.)
What are the best social media manager tools?
We recommend the following social media marketing tools for a streamlined approach to social media for small businesses:
- Content categories. Create a list of 5-10 branded categories for your social media content. These act as “buckets” where all of your content will fall within. For example, if you are a restaurant owner, some buckets would be: featured menu item, meet the team, behind the scenes, special event/ news, community spotlight. Then each week, you release content from one of the buckets and it will go in a pattern of rotating the content through the buckets.
- Content calendar. A content calendar acts as the baseline for your social media channels. We suggest printing out a month calendar and filling it up with content to be released on the times / days where your customers are on the most. Generally speaking you should most at minimum 1x a week and as much as 4-5. Ensure that the content you fill in the calendar rotates through the categories you posted above.
- Social Media Scheduler. There are many social media scheduler options. Among popular ones are Hootesuite, Social Pilot and AgoraPulse. A few important things to consider when choosing a social media scheduler are as follows:
- Can the scheduler schedule to all the platforms that you want them to? Some schedulers are more comprehensive than others.
- What kind of reporting do they offer and what do you need for reporting?
- Do you want to be able to respond to all social media messages from all channels in one spot/
Is social media management right for your small business?
Any leader looking for a streamlined approach to social media managing should invest in social media software. Since time is the currency in which we invest in – invest well by making the most out of your time. Create content categories, create a content calendar, write content for the entire month, schedule it out and monitor the analytics for your content’s ranking so that your time spent the rest of the month can be spent on what matters most.
Do you need help managing company social media? At Banowetz Marketing, our customers have found success with our social media management support. Find out more here.
