15 Productivity Hacks For Social Media

Productivity

May 23

typing on laptop social media notifications

Social media is the #1 way small businesses and solopreneurs can lose productivity. No other marketing tool can suck you in and widdle away the hours like diving into Facebook, getting distracted, and reacting to whatever notifications pop up. It's not just Facebook though. How many times have you found yourself lost in the amazing-ness of Pinterest, or scrolling down your Instagram feed 30 minutes after you opened it?

If you're responsible for your brand's social media, chances are you lose a ton of time trying to find good content to share. Do you meander around the interwebs looking for good blogs to share or viral posts? You need a system for that - stat!

While I used to manage entire social media strategies, I now solely focus on Pinterest. But the strategies and tools I’ve picked up to help me stay productive still work.

Here are my super-duper tools and tricks for keeping my productivity on track.

01. Eliminate Social Media Accounts

Wait what? Yes. Not all of them - obviously.

Take a serious look at your brand and target audience. Pick the top 3 social media networks where your target audience spends their time. If you're posting the same stuff across too many accounts, you're wasting time and not providing unique content for each platform.

Not to mention the time you're wasting posting to a redundant account that your target audience isn't on anyway.

02. Editorial Calendar

There's nothing like a good old spreadsheet to keep track of what to post when. You can start with major promotions and fill in content from there. Even a weekly guide for what type of content you're going to post on which days is better than nothing.

Having a plan keeps you on track and eliminates the desperation of trying to figure out what you're going to post that day at the last minute.

Keep reading and I’ll circle back to how I do this only 4x per year for Pinterest.

03. Schedule Posts

There are a whole bunch of apps that will help you schedule your social media posts. They usually have a phone app and browser extension as part of their app too, which will help you use it no matter what device you're on.

Because I don’t do general social media for my clients anymore, Tailwind is the only scheduling tool I need. It lets me batch my Pinterest queue and save tons of time. It takes me about an hour once per month to schedule a month's worth of content with a 10x/day schedule.

You can also use Tailwind for Instagram scheduling if that’s one of your chosen platforms.

Get a month of Tailwind for free with my affiliate link!

04. Time Block - Sort Of

Most people are familiar with the concept of Time Blocking. While time blocking might work for some people, I found it to be a little too restrictive as a work-from-home mom and entrepreneur.

I came up with the Theme Day Planning Method using my version of an Ideal Work Week (grab a free printable version here).

Whatever method you use - one task at a time is essential to staying on track and completing tasks with efficiency. You might have to try a few different methods (I sure did), but knowing how you're going to spend your time and committing to it works wonders.

For me, I know the top 3 essential tasks I have to complete each day and I generally “theme” my days.

For example, I work on my own content on Mondays, client work is on Tuesday, admin is on Friday, etc.

For your social media marketing, you will want to time block for content curation, scheduling, engagement, blogging (if you blog), post graphics, and special projects.

05. Google Alerts

Let the internet come to you. Instead of searching, clicking, more searching, more clicking - set up a Google Alert for your brand to know instantly if it's mentioned somewhere.

You can set up Google Alerts for anything you want to keep an eye on for content curation.

06. RSS Feed Reader

Speaking of content curation, setting up an RSS Feed (I like either Feedly or Feeder) is my main content curation tool for my posts. You can set up feeds by topic, or dump the RSS feeds of blogs into another feed (like a 'To Read' feed).

07. Google Drive

Google Drive is where I keep all documents and assets relating to my business and client work. It syncs across all devices so I can access it from my phone if I want to post to Instagram, or my desktop when I'm in full-work-mode.

Here are a few ways I use Google Drive:

I write all my blogs here first before I upload them to my website.
I have a note full of industry-specific hashtags I use on Instagram.
I write out all my email sequences for my lead magnet funnels.
I use their Forms feature for client applications and membership surveys.
I keep all my internal team training videos and assets here too.

08. Grammarly

No one is perfect and there is a lot more leeway nowadays for typos, but it's something you should still avoid like the plague. Grammarly is a browser extension and app that will automatically review what you're typing for grammar and spelling errors.

09. Graphic Templates

Every social media post that pertains to your business should be accompanied by a custom, branded graphic in the right size for the particular social media network you are posting to.

Posting stand-alone images and links to other business' content that you've curated is fine, but your content should be easily recognizable as yours.

I use Canva Pro to be able to work on graphics with my team, without having to update files like in Photoshop.

I love IvoryMix and Beach Babe for stock photos and templates to make using Canva super easy.

10. Email Marketing

There are lots of email marketing providers out there and you’ll have to choose the one that fits best for you. Use it to create signup lists for freebie content, and to create autoresponder campaigns for email courses.

Having a system integrated with my social media posts and blog content lets me set it and forget it.

I personally use and love ConvertKit - if you sign up with my affiliate link, you can get a whole month to try it out for free.

11. Tweetdeck

Is Twitter your jam? The #1 way to stay on top of Twitter chats and relevant hashtags is Tweetdeck. When I was the Social Media Manager for Megadeth, I had an entire computer monitor dedicated to just Tweetdeck. I had columns for the band, each band member, endorsers, other bands they were touring with, and hashtag searches for anyone talking about the band or band members.

While that might be waaaay above and beyond what you need to do, you can use it to participate in Twitter chats and follow hashtag trends that are relevant to your business.

12. Twitter Lists

Speaking of Twitter, if you follow as few as 100 users, it can be really hard to keep up. If you follow thousands, it's an exponentially impossible task. Twitter lists allow you to curate different users into categories for you to follow more easily. Create lists for leaders in your industry, clients, top interactors, and so on.

13. Tab Group

Tab Group is a browser extension that let’s you “group” sets of tab together for ease of use. This way you can open up a set of tabs depending on what you’re working on so you can really focus.

For example, I have a tab group for my financial admin, for working on membership content, for each client, etc.

This has been key in eliminating having 30 browser tabs open (or more!) at a time.

14. Brain.fm

Speaking of focus - I have used Brain.fm for more than 8 years and I could not live without it.

It works with your brainwaves depending on what you need - whether that’s to focus, mediate, sleep, or just chill.

...and finally...

15. Disable Notifications

Don't let social media notifications on your phone cause you to be so reactive you don't get anything else done. Simply disabling all social media notifications on your phone, and sticking to the time block dedicated for social media work, will free up more time than you realized. Don’t forget Newsfeed Eradicator for Facebook!

Putting these tools and tricks into play will help you take control of your social media productivity. Even just implementing one of these at a time will work wonders.

In my Distraction-Free Living eBook, I show all the tips and hacks to help you eliminate common distractions so you can focus intentionally on your life and business goals.