Social media is an excellent way to start building your online presence, and build expertise in your field. If you don’t have a list yet – start with social media. If you already have a list and want to make it bigger – start using social media.
But the most common objection I hear from speakers and coaches is that they don’t want to waste their time poking people on facebook and twittering people. I totally understand. And as speakers and coaches we’re busy people. Between juggling the speaking gigs, coaching/consulting clients, and now doing all this online marketing stuff, how can you possibly have time to be constantly checking your facebook and twitter?
The other question I hear all the time is, “Is the energy I put in worth the energy I get out?” If building thousands of new followers/fans in a few months and connecting with other experts in your field doesn’t interest you, then move on. If not, I can show you how to manage your social media account in no more than 30 minutes a day.
Start with twitter.
1. Do this work during the time of day you are most unproductive. You know what time that is for you. For me that’s about 10:30 or 11:00 pm. Now you will make productive use of otherwise unproductive time.
2. Find the top 100 blogs in your area of expertise and follow those blogs in an RSS Reader. Just click the RSS icon (the orange on usually next to the other social media icons) and copy the web address into a Google Reader account under “Subscribe.”
Find these blogs by searching StumbleUpon.com, Alltop.com, and Technorati.com for your subject.
3. During this designated 30 minutes, scan the Google Reader for interesting content that your audience would find interesting and helpful. Select 8 to 10 different blog posts. Just scan Google Reader, it will give you a preview of each post. Click on the 8-10 that look most interesting and open them up in new tabs.
4. Plug those 8-10 blog posts into a twitter scheduler. I use Hootsuite.com, but there are other such as SocialOomph.com. Using these tools you can schedule these tweets to be posted from your twitter account throughout the day. Space them about 30 min. to an hour apart and random intervals.
5. Getting followers to click on your twitter links is all about writing catchy headlines. Appeal to curiousity, use lists (top ten…), and challenge commonly held beliefs in your market place.
That’s all you do. In just 30 minutes each day you’ll be able to begin establishing yourself as an expert in your field on social media. There’s no magic money machine to twitter or facebook (that’s called your website) so take baby steps with this and build is over time. You won’t be a superstar overnight.
Well, that should get you off to a strong start. But if you want to know much more…
Related articles
- How To Adopt A Social Media Lifestyle (adrsocialmedia.wordpress.com)
