This is a guest post from Jason Koertge.
Mark’s recent post, Channel Your Inner Zen Habits: 30 Minutes a Day Small Business Social Media Strategy hit the “social media” nail right on the head. As such, I thought I would share some secrets to how I manage what can be a huge work load, but doesn’t have to be.
For much of the social media marketing work I do, in an effort to prevent myself from trading “dollars for hours”, I set a time limit upfront for each session.
If I’m going to work on something for 30 minutes, I’ll set my countdown timer on my watch for 30 and stop working on that project when it goes off. This particular technique I gleamed from Tim Ferris when I read his Four Hour Work Week.
The idea is to give yourself a set time limit to do something, whether it can really be done in that time or not and then just do it. By forcing yourself into this model, you will get into the habit of “hacking” new ways to do things that will boost your productivity enormously and ultimately allow you to spend less time working.
For me, the less time I spend working, the more time I have to play with my kids.
As an example, one particular project that I’m working on I first spent some time defining goals and determining what I wanted to accomplish using social media. This project is retail oriented and I figured the audience needed a place to find current specials and deals and snippets of information that related to the retail environment itself. Some updates are live from events on property, other updates are random questions about the property aimed at engaging the audience, but most are repopulated posts that I write in advance and schedule using an awesome service called Hootsuite.
The point is that much of the “work” you can do in social media can be automated and save enormous amounts of time if a little thought is put into it. Now, while this isn’t applicable to all social media efforts, it may be applicable to whatever you are doing.
You should keep in mind though, that social media is all about communication.
More importantly, using Social Media for business is all about personal communication and I would not recommend a social campaign that is fully automated.
My 30 minute social media “sessions” are not always spent in messaging, per se. As mentioned above, part of using social media is having the ability to communicate in a personal and sincere way. If you are using Twitter, for instance, it would behoove you to continually monitor your @replies. This is how people communicate back to you. Many times you’ll find comments and questions directed at you and this is your opportunity to build relationships.
When someone is communicating with you, this is your chance to show them that you are listening.
If I’m using a Facebook fan page, I’ll scroll through the timeline and post comments after other’s comments. Again, the whole goal is to show that I’m listening.
I’m a task-list maker and I’m not as diligent as some I know, but I found that if I spend a couple minutes making a list of what I want to accomplish, it is much easier for me to get my “work” done in 30 minutes. In fact, if I didn’t have a list, 30 minute work sessions would not be possible for me.
For you, getting 30 minute sessions to work for you will take practice. You’ll have to learn tricks that are applicable to you to get things done quickly and you’ll have to define and refine the tools you use. But, once you get it, you’re entire workflow will change and you’ll ultimately have more time to play or do whatever you choose to do with your time.
Using Social Media as a marketing medium can be a powerful way to engage your customers in personal and sincere conversation. Building close relationships will grow your business and ultimately lead to more profits.
About the author: Jason Koertge has blogged professionally for more than 3 years. You can find him at TooCreative.com, where he blogs daily about how to use Social Media as a marketing tool.
It is all about setting goals, giving 100% on a limited time and being content! The work you’ll have to do will just come out if you follow this steps! Nice post!
The clock picture only shows fifteen minutes.
I am an avid defender of list making – but in my mind’s eye I can already see how putting times to each item of the list would help me accomplish. I can think of so many times where I just sit around and think for ever about what to blog, instead of buckling down and writing about one of topics already in hand. Also, I write two blogs a day and keep them to publish once a day, so that I stay about a week or two ahead of myself – that way I can afford to take time off. Working hard now means playing hard later!
Good stuff.
THanks for the post – I really enjoyed it.
“For me, the less time I spend working, the more time I have to play with my kids.” The very reason I am self employed! A wonderful work-ethic to have.
Thanks for the post. I have also subscribed to your rss. :)
One thing timed sessions do is put you under time pressure, which wouldn’t necessarily exist otherwise in some of our day to day tasks.
I first realised it last summer when on a 5 week beach vacation. I still had things to get done, but since I’d rather sit on the beach than sit in front of a laptop I was *very* focused on what I was doing.
I found that by spending 30 minutes to an hour every day I was being super productive, to the extent of getting far more done than some entire regular work days.
So, back to work in September I decided to start working under timed sessions of an hour; I’m now doing 25 minute “pomodoros” with a 5 minute break at the end for all my critical tasks, which works extremely well.
Hi David – Amazing how much you can accomplish on the beach, eh? Because of the nature of my business (guest needs at various hours) I tend to lack time management discipline and have found, as you describe above, timed sessions with a little reward break can work wonders.