This Doesn't Have to Be Hard

It's not unusual for small business friends of mine to say, "Yeah, but you're a marketer - you're supposed to have a blog and a dozen social media channels.  I don't have the time to do any of that."

Does that sound like you?

And boom, there goes another Tweet!

Well, let me let you in on a little secret.  I'm a small business too, and like you, I don't have tons of time either.  I have my business, family and hobbies to balance (not to mention sleep).

I am writing this post on November 19, 2013.  I'm having to stay close to the house because both of my kids are home from school sick.  I had to cancel several meetings and appointments for today.

Note the post date on this post... see that?  December 10, 2013?  What am I, some sort of crazy time traveler?

Nope.  I'm making productive use of this unexpected unbooked time, by writing blog content and I'm scheduling social media through the first and second week of December. 

I use Blogger, and I can write any time (sometimes I have three to five posts in progress) and I can schedule my post far out into the future.  I can also schedule the associated social media mentions of my blog the same day, once the post is scheduled.  You can do the same with Wordpress and many other blogging applications out there.

I aim to post twice a week (Tuesday and Thursday mornings), but you can post less frequently than I do in many cases.  So I can write and set up posts now that I can post a month or more in the future.

This is especially great when you start developing content calendars and themes - you can easily pull together themed posts on your blog and in your social media all at once while the topic is top of mind.

A tool I swear by is Hootsuite.  I've talked about it before, and yes, I know there are more powerful tools out there, but I believe its simplicity for newbies is hard to beat.  Plus, it's free for less than five accounts.  Great for the most commonly used networks of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+.

I've been advising lots of businesses lately to try Pinterest in their social media mix, but you can't use Hootsuite to schedule pins.  There are tools out there, and here's a discussion you might want to read if you use Pinterest: How To Schedule Pins on Pinterest.

If you must do this stuff yourself, using the right tools, it isn't hard at all!

On a weekly basis, block out time for you to sit down and do this stuff (mine in Monday morning).

When you find you get a gift of extra time - like I did today - use it productively and get ahead of the game, if you can.

Need tips?  Maybe some help with a content calendar?  I can help - let me know!

Doing Things on the Cheap (DOTC): A Series

Starting today, I’m going to be sharing with you some ideas for things to do when you don’t have a ton of money and/or time to spend on various activities for your business.  I'm calling it "Doing Things On The Cheap (DOTC)".

Why  yes, my ideal customer includes elephants.

This series assumes you know what your budget is – how much you have to spend in operations (on such things as product, equipment, rent, insurance, tax compliance, etc.), and how much you can invest in marketing activities.

You also know how much time you need to spend on your product/service (to make your revenue goals) and how much time you need for other purposes (for example, most people sleep 49-56 hours a week).

You've also identified your ideal customer, crafted your value proposition and your core message, and have a good idea on where they can be found.

Yes?  Cool.

No?  Let's Talk.

Keep an eye out for posts titled "DOTC" and tagged "cheap stuff".  I'll be talking mostly about marketing tools and tactics, but I want to make sure ya'll are aware of the free/cheap business tools out there - and there's TONS.

So here's a quick tip:

I'm going to discuss various services and apps that Google offers in more depth later, but if you have a Gmail account, you have up to 15GB free storage on Google Drive associated to your account.

This is awesome for being able to access your stuff on the go from various computers and devices, or as a backup tool in case your computer gets fried.

I highly recommend anyone with a Gmail account to use this service, as it's very secure and every day you do not back up your important files is a day you are risking a disaster of epic proportions.

Learn more about Google Drive here and read the basic support information here.  I'm a hard core user of Drive, so if you have any questions, drop me a note!