Author: Hollie Clere

#GiftYourBusiness – Gift of Budget

There are new social media tools being created every day. Many of these tools make the process of curating and scheduling content more efficient and less time-consuming. When it comes to running your own business, saving time is one of the most important aspects of becoming profitable. Therefore, one of the best ways to gift your business this holiday season is to sign up and incorporate some free social media and online tools into your daily routine. Here are recommendations for some of my favorite free social tools.
Canva
Since visual content is so important to social media, a tool like Canva is invaluable. Canva allows users to create social media and marketing images quickly and easily. These high-quality, easy to design images can be used anywhere. Not everyone is a graphic designer or has access to photo editing software. Canva eliminates the need for either of those and makes image creation simple and amazing.
Buffer
For those maintaining a presence on Twitter, Buffer is a fabulous free tool. Buffer allows users to track their follower activity and gives suggestions as to the best time to post or schedule tweets. It has built in scheduling and analytics. The analyticsmeasures all major engagement statistics for posts on the major platforms.
Hootsuite
If we were to log into social mediaevery day, all the time, nothing else would ever get accomplished. However, it’s important that our brands remain reliable and visible on each of the social platforms to maintain our following. Hootsuite is a widely known and popular tool for scheduling out content. It has also RSS feed capabilities and allows users to interact on various platforms via one place.
Commun.it
Another tool that is nearly essential for Twitter users is Commun.it. This tool is based on the need to stay on top of relationship management within the platform. It tracks all the major interaction on your Twitter account and automatically works to nurture and engage fans and followers on the site.  The tool monitors what others are saying about you, your brand and your business. It also shows who is linking to your site, discovers new leads for you, tracks who follows and unfollows, and reports back on community engagement. There are options to auto-engage people who follow, mention, post or retweet your content. This helps keep Twitter accounts relevant on a platform that moves very quickly.
Paper.li

This tool provides an area online to automatically curate and organize content based on chosen topics. It is displayed in a visually appealing newspaper format. These newspapers are a great place to gather together content into a readable feed. Feeds can be organized by topic or by type of media. Users can create multiple newspaper feeds at a time and can follow people, lists, and hashtags. It also has the capability to follow Twitter lists without actually following them via your own Twitter account.
These are just some of the tools available to make life and work easier for business owners and marketers. All of these tools offer a paid upgrade option with additional features in case you stumble upon one you just absolutely love and want access to additional benefits. However, each of these tools can be incorporated into your company today at no cost to you. So, give your business the gift of both time and money this holiday season by finding tools that make you more productive.  Use all that extra time you now have to come up with even more ways to #BeAwesome!
~ Social Media is changing the way people do business.  Don’t get left behind ~ 


Be sure to Follow us and Let’s Engage!

Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “#BeAwesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Content Manager, Trainer and Author in LinkedIn,Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Google+ , YouTube,Pinterest, Instagram  and the tools to manage them. 

Click here for her Social Media Workshops, Classes and Seminars.

Social Seven: Tools of the Trade – Editorial Calendars and Trello

If you don’t have a routine or a schedule, you aren’t going to be consistent with your social media. So, it makes sense to build an editorial calendar. What do you use to build a calendar for your content? This can depend on the client. Everyone has thrie own themes and weekly schedule. Each one is so drastically different, as are their posting options. A social media manager could use tools like Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Google Drive and Dropbox for different purposes. However, that means pulling from a variety of different places. Therefore, it makes sense to have everything in one spot instead of duplicating efforts.
Trello is an online tool for scheduling. There are so many things you can do with it. Trello can be set up for one clientor many. There are various boards, lists and cards for each client. You can be very narrow with what you are doing. Typically, with an editorial calendar for a client is there is a social media strategy. In Trello, you create cards. These cards include brief descriptions on what to post, hashtags, timing and anything else pertinent to that schedule.
One major perk to Trello is that images that have been created to share can be placed onto these cards as well. Text can also be added so that everything for the post is in one place. Also, the client can be added in order to review the cards before they are posted. Due dates can be added and reminders via email will be sent to remind team members or clients to approve or review the posts.
Trello also allows users to label the cards with custom labels to help with organization. Then it can be copied into Hootsuite or whatever other scheduling tool is being used to post the content.  For Twitter, it may be better to use something different such as a Google spreadsheet or an Excel file. This is mainly due to the bulk uploading nature of that platform.
There are other tools available such as Base Camp, One Note and Evernote that could be used as well. Base Camp and Trello are very similar. Unfortunately, Base Camp gives you only a specific amount of time to make changes or edit a post, which could cause some issues in the long term. The idea is to keep you organized. Don’t let yourself run dry. Try out some new tools and see if you can make them work for you!
Think these might help you with scheduling content and staying on top of your social media? Follow us on social media to find out when our Social Seven podcast is streaming live!

#GiftYourBusiness – The Gift of Team

As we cover different ways in which you can gift your business this holiday season, we need to focus on adding team. For many small business owners, it can feel overwhelming tackling all the different aspects of owning a business. There is a lot that goes into what you do that is most likely outside of your passionor your calling. Or there is a stack of work that keeps piling up but you haven’t been able to figure out how to find more time in order to tackle all of it. If either of those cases sound like you, it’s time to find help.
What Type of Help Do You Need?
When it comes to finding help there are a variety of different methods available to business owners. You could go find and hire an employee. You could hire a company or vendor and outsource the work. There is also the possibility of hiring an independent contractor on a project or task basis. What are the differences?
Employee
An employee is someone that works for you and you are in charge of the work, the output, the hours and other aspects of the role. As a company, you will need to provide equipment, space, payroll and a set number of hours. An employee will represent your company and all work will be completely under your control. This can be an expensive choice for small businesses in the beginning due to the overhead costs of hiring your own team member.
Vendor
There are plenty of reputable companies available that specialize in the type of work you need help with. Contracting with a company for a project or service is as simple as finding a landscaper or plumber for your personal residence. You’d contact them, interview them, discuss costs and payment and set up an arrangement. The project, staff and delivery method would be discussed up front but that is where your control of the work ends. However, you would be able to terminate the service at any time without fearing legal repercussions.
Independent Contractor
An independent contractor is a blend of the two options. They can be tasked like an employee but provide their own equipment and set their own hours. You would pay them like a vendor and would not need to be concerned with payroll or benefits. They have control over how they accomplish the task given, but you can work closely with them to establish a better working relationship than you would be able to with a company or service provider.
Using Social Media to Find Team
There are a lot of traditional ways to find and recruit team members. However, since my realm is social media I’d like to focus on using social to find help. The first step in transitioning connections into team is to make sure you have built a brand, company culture, with your own social media.  The impact of attempting to recruit using social is that interested team members will go to your social media first to determine whether or not to work with you.  By focusing on your social media you are building a funnel of connections automatically – so, attracting the right type of connections will be so much more effective. This is a way to encourage the right person to want to sign up for what you do even before you start posting for help.
Ask Your Network
The first thing to do when seeking help using your social channels is to simply post asking for referrals. In your vast network of followers and fans, someone will probably know a person that is able and willing to do the work you need help with. Be sure to bring it up at networking events and ask for suggestions in that network as well. For Twitter, plan to post at least once per day that you are looking for assistance. On Facebook, plan a post per week until you find what you are seeking.
LinkedIn
When thinking about recruiting, people often think of the local classifieds, staffing agencies and top recruiting websites. However, LinkedIn is not only the social media platform for businesses and professionals but it also has a fantastic built in recruiting area. While you could pay money to post a job ad, try just posting an update asking for help first. Your LinkedIn network will see your update and might know a great place for you to look!
Use Groups
Facebook and LinkedIn both have group functions that can connect you with a like-minded group of individuals. It’s a great spot to ask for help or simply to ask for ideas on where to find help. Utilize the expertise and knowledge of the people in these groups to find the team members you need to be successful in the new year.

Finding team members via your network or social media is not a complicated process and doesn’t take up a lot of time. However, locating a valuable individual to help unload your plate so you can focus on being more strategic is a great way to start off the new year on the right foot. I want you to #BeAwesome in all that you do and that is why spending time this month to #GiftYourBusiness will help you become more successful.
~ Social Media is changing the way people do business.  Don’t get left behind ~ 

Be sure to Follow us and Let’s Engage!

Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “#BeAwesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Content Manager, Trainer and Author in LinkedIn,Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Google+ , YouTube,Pinterest, Instagram  and the tools to manage them. 

Click here for her Social Media Workshops, Classes and Seminars.

Social Seven: Tools of the Trade – Dropbox and Google Drive

Social Seven – Social Media Podcast

With Erin Cell of Socially Powered and Hollie Clere of The Social Media Advisor




Here are some sharing tools to keep yourself organized: Dropbox and Google Drive. These tools utilize cloud computing, which is not a new concept but is becoming more popular. For those who have teams, you can add your teams to either Dropbox or Google Drive to share files and information. There are pros and cons to both. It might be a good idea to pick just one of these tools or you might find yourself checking both when you can’t remember what you put on which one.
Be cautious when using the cloud, it’s possible to share a virus on one file with all the other files on the site. This isn’t a fault of Dropbox or Google Drive, but it can be an issue. Make sure to keep your anti-virus software current and follow safety techniques when opening and downloading attachments and programs.
One benefit to using these types of tools is that if your personal hard drive crashes, all of these files are kept on the cloud. It can be costly, and sometimes impossible, to recover files from a crashed system.
Those who have a Chromebook will find that Google Drive is even more practical. The best part of Drive is the shareability and being able to share documents with others easily. Users can create documents, spreadsheets and presentations right there in the drive. The files are live and automatically updated. No need to worry about using the most current version since the file is in real time. It auto saves frequently and can be edited right in Google Drive. It can be accessed from anywhere since it is an Internet based tool.
If you have a Gmail account, use just the one account for your mail, your Google drive, YouTube and other Google products. It’s so much easier when everything is connected.

There are other cloud based sharing apps that could work well for you. Educate yourself on all the optimal uses for all of these tools.

Think these might help you with scheduling content and staying on top of your social media? Follow us on social media to find out when our Social Seven podcast is streaming live!

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