Tag: Commun.it

#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 ~ 


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Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “#BeAwesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Content Manager, Trainer and Author in LinkedIn,FacebookTwitterBlogGoogle+ , 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 – Commun.it

Social Seven – Social Media Podcast

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




What is the primary function of Commun.it? It is a Twitter tool used for scheduling and managing this social media platform. It can be used to stay connected with new followers, to stay engaged, and to monitor clients and mentions. Users can follow/unfollow and track who is following and unfollowing them on Twitter right within the tool. It will send a reminder to let users know when it’s time to reconnect with someone. Commun.it also offers suggestions on accounts you might like to follow.
We do tend to get really busy and lose track of the last time we connected with someone within our communities. It’s social media. It’s meant to be social. That means stepping outside of your box and actually having online conversations with people and engaging with them frequently. It’s not just a matter of pushing content out. Acknowledge when someone shares something of yours and when you get mentioned. If someone asks you a question, you should at least respond.
Commu.it includes some canned responses that can be used to immediately reply to specific types of engagement. Try not to overdo it, as real engagement is more valuable and effective than automated responding. However, this can be a way to stay on top of the fast pace of Twitter.
These tools also include worthy analytics that can be used for tracking effectiveness and then submitted to clients.
Using Hootsuite, Buffer and Commun.it combined is a fabulous way to optimize your social media content management. Commun.it is an easy to use tool, that is simple, and worth checking out. These tools will help you increase your online engagement, which will help to organically grow your audience.
It’s social people; let these tools help you remain social!

Think Commun.it 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!

Top Tools In Planning and Managing Your Social Media

https://thesocialmediaadvisor.com/Services.html

We talk frequently about content, consistency and planning ahead using editorial calendars.  We have gathered up a handful of content posting tools, management options and response platforms for you to try on for your business and success in online marketing with social media.  


Content Scheduling Tool

From TweetDeck and HootSuite seem to have the most similar options for Content Scheduling, but we prefer and recommend  HootSuite to our clients.  There are not only :”Free” options (for brands with under 3 profiles to manage), but affordable upgraded  options that provide value and (at times) critical options for Team Assignments, App Integration, Custom Reporting and  engagement options right in the platform.  There are over 75 (the list continues to grow and change frequently) application tools  such as RSS feed integration, newsletter integration and a variety of follower tracking options.
If you are looking to optimize budget and scalability, this is a great tool for that. You can register for a trial version of the upgraded option at: http://bit.ly/15gQM7t

Content Idea Tool

All of your content should be rich with ideas, perspectives, tips, testimonials, news and rich with images.  If you haven’t incorporated a Blog yet, definitely consider including one in your marketing strategies as it adds searchable evergreen content to the search engines providing updates to you’re your website, links to your site and a storehouse of content to be used and reused at later times (which helps with visibility and maintaining consistency).

Should you run dry on content ideas, you should consider sharing posts and blogs from influencers in your industry.  This increases your credibility and enhances the expertize in your brand. Sharing (with permission) from influencers is great for industry networking, co-marketing and enhances your viewers relationship with you.

**If you are only sharing your own content, your audience will feel bored and “spammed” with self promotion.

I recommend using “Suggestion” ideas from HootSuite and Buffer: http://www.buffer.com  I find a wider variety of suggested post ideas from my industry influencers, inspiring quotes, etc.  You can customize your options in both tools as well.

Management Tool for Engagement

Managing conversations, replying and pruning followers are key to keep up with fresh visibility and show your presence is active and engaging.  In addition to engagement options in HootSuite and Buffer, I like the functionality of Commun.it  which allows you to clean up your follower list, send auto (customizable) responses to engagement and a variety of scheduling and reporting options.  It really helps you learn more about your audience and how they engage best with you.

To try out Communi.it, click: http://bit.ly/1RKhPv2

BONUS: Tool for Creating Images for your Brand

As an added BONUS, because visual content is key in ALL of your online marketing, I recommend a popular tool called, Canva found at http://www.canva.com

Canva provides you with template and low cost options for creating branded images quickly and easily for your blog, website and social media posts that are already formatted in the dimensions you need for your brand.  It is an easy to use tool that is very cost effective, maintained well and a variety of tutorials are available as well.

Keeping your social media consistent and up to date with the most engagement options possible, I encourage you to try on these tools, build an editorial calendar to maintain visibility and remember, if you aren’t having fun, you are doing it wrong.

To your success!

~ Social Media is changing the way people do business.  Don’t get left behind ~ 



Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “Be Awesome” 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

The Power of Using Tools to Manage Social Media

http://www.thesocialmediaadvisor.com


There are so many activities that surround management of relationships and brands in Social Media, it would be virtually impossible to effectively maintain consistency without the use of Tools to help you to schedule and provide you with a Dashboard to Moderate.
One of my favorite tools is HootSuite.  It is affordable, flexible and allows you to post to most of the popular social media platforms.  It even has the ability to integrate over 70 apps to make your life even easier.
I have a testimonial that was shared with me about HootSuitefrom a brand manager we trained recently.  She words for a small Dental Office here in Colorado and struggled to remember each day to post something to Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+.  She actually had a time span of 2 months where she neglected to post anything because it was just too inconvenient to dedicate her self to a specific window of time each day.
She was also getting stuck in a negative loop of dry ideas and lost the ability to come up with any original content.  Frustrated, we sat down for training and she realized there were tools she could use to overcome these obstacles.
Here are my Top 3 Tools right now:

-> HootSuite
For the ease of the dashboard and consistent schedule abilities

-> Buffer
For the Suggested Content Ideas and the integration of Pinterest scheduling options!

-> Commun.it
For helping me communicate more effectively with my twitter audience

People ask me all of the time why I feel scheduling is so important.  My theory is simple.  When I am actively doing my work, I’m not thinking about what to post at 9am.  If I take the time to effectively put together a good editorial calendar and get updates out, I can respond better “real time” to engagement and not always have to feel “on” to generate new content.  Some days I run dry, other days I am free flowing with thought, ideas and creativity.  I have found that if I maximize my creative time as much as possible, the brand won’t be lacking when my juice is spent.
Additionally, I believe that there should be “real time” posts woven through the scheduled posts as well.  Examples could be: a moment just happened, attending an event, news or trends are current and relate to something in our day; these are things that should be shared “real time”, as often as possible.
Every single SMM (Social Media Manager) will tell you how “they” like to do it.  Neither is right, neither is wrong, both types of processes set you up for success if that is a method that works for you.  That is the most important thing to take away.  Find a tool that works for you, use it, own it, learn from it and make it fun.
If we aren’t having fun, we are doing it wrong!  #BeAwesome

If you would like to learn how to use HootSuite, our next Webinar can be found at: http://thesocialpro.eventbrite.com

 

~ Social Media is changing the way people do business.  Don’t get left behind ~ 


Hollie Clere, of The Social Media Advisor is a “Be Awesome” Developer, Social Media Brand Builder, Conent 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

http://www.socialpowerprogram.com/

Curious on whether your social brand is built properly?  Get your Social Media Analysis today. 
 

http://www.thesocialmediaadvisor.com/Social_Media_Analysis.html


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