Without a doubt, marketing with social media is a must for your business. It has impacted every aspect of our lives, including the time we waste monitoring it.So how can we effectively build our online presence while reducing the wasteful time we spend tweeting, posting, and updating our various social sites?Creating a social media strategy and setting up a distribution plan will help you steer clear of the many “time sucks” like distracting games, gossip and other non-money making endeavors.Sure there’s a time and place to play games, but it's not while you're working. Granted, you may not have a boss looking over your shoulder, but that doesn’t give you a hall pass to allow non-productive habits.

6 Time Saving Strategies for Social Media Success

Map Your Destination

If you have yet to sit down and map out your social media destination, you are not likely to succeed. Of course, there are always the lucky ones who somehow manage to hit the lottery after they have only purchased one ticket.But for most of us, success comes from careful and thoughtful planning. Don't set out recklessly with a hit-or-miss strategy. Instead, create a plan and stick to it, adjusting as needed.

Know Your Audience

Social Media offers us the unique ability to throw our marketing net out further than ever before. We are able to get our message in front of a much larger audience, but with that come accountability and responsibility.We are responsible for monitoring our time and holding ourselves accountable to our goals. It’s easy to lose sight of who our audience is or what our online purpose is. Before you dive into social media, map your destination and know who your target audience is.

Create a Distribution Plan

I’m often asked what my blogging philosophy is regarding content distribution. With so many blogging platforms to choose from: WordPress, Active Rain, Posterous, Real Estate Marbles, Tumblr, and Blogger, it’s a difficult decision to determine where your post should originate.The most important piece is to start with the blogging platform you are comfortable with before creating your social media strategy. ALL of your original content should begin on your blog and push out to other social media sites.

Use Automation Tools

Automating a few of your social media posts is another great time saver. There are quite a few tools to choose from that allow you to schedule your posts.Plus, some tools can post to multiple sites all at once. This time-saving tool will free up your time so you can spend it interacting and conversing with potential clients rather than just pushing information out to them.Automation Options:

Outsource Tasks (not the Conversation!)

Yes, it is possible to outsource certain elements of social media. A virtual assistant can arrange all your automation. They can also keep track of your metrics, and alert you to important tweets or buzz that you need to address in a blog post or in a direct message to someone.A good long-term virtual assistant can even answer your direct messages for you when needed. Outsourcing isn’t for everyone, but it is a solution for someone that just doesn’t enjoy working with social media on a daily basis.

Shut It Down

Yep, you read that right. When you're done with work, you should be done with social media for your business. There isn’t any reason to tweet, respond to Facebook posts or comment on blogs 24/7.It will only serve to distract you from money making tasks and keep you from enjoying other important aspects of your life. There are better and more effective ways to monitor social media and at some point, you need a life outside social media.

Final Thoughts

With proper planning, implementation and perseverance your social media efforts can and will pay off.You can build your presence, drive more traffic to your website and blog, write more business and see success you never thought possible.