What if I told you that there is a way to do less work but actually reach more people with your company news, products and services? Interested? While I cannot advise you on the best ways to find more money in your budget, I can offer some suggestions developed by others that will give your business a smart marketing advantage.
Developing and executing strong marketing campaigns takes a lot of work. In large corporations, entire departments are devoted to this task. For small businesses and sole proprietors, marketing tasks often fall on employees or business owners that wear other hats too. There is literally not enough time in the workday to accomplish all the promotional tasks that large and small companies wish they could achieve, especially considering the vast outreach opportunities the internet-age presents.
What if I told you that there is a way to do less work but actually reach more people with your company news, products and services? Interested? While I cannot advise you on the best ways to find more money in your budget, I can offer some suggestions developed by others that will give your business a smart marketing advantage.
Here are five leading apps that will market your business on your behalf, or at least give you some shortcuts to doing it more efficiently yourself:
Buffer: Does your company have a schedule for posting Tweets each day to avoid overwhelming followers with too many links at a time? Or do you post everything all at once so that you do not forget later on? Perhaps you do not even have a Tweet-posting schedule or any idea what time of day is optimal based on your followers. The Twitter-specific app Buffer takes the guesswork out of posting frequency and completely eliminates the need to log in several times each day to update Tweets. Users can pre-write their updates, choose a customized schedule and go grab a cup of coffee while the app does the posting work.
Twilert: Signing up for Google Alerts is a smart way to get a summary of the topics trending in your industry on a consistent basis. Twilert combines this helpful tool with information from Twitter in order to gather user-specific information in one concise email. With a quick glance, marketing decision-makers can develop a real-time plan based on trending topics on Twitter. Forget going to several different sites to find the information you need for effective Twitter postings – just check your email for Twilert’s data.
Perch: Market research sucks precious time and money from company budgets but is necessary for development of effective marketing plans. The app Perch keeps an eye on local competitors for you through social media posts, online directory review sites and official website offerings. Businesses can see what others are saying about competitors and also be alerted of competing sales or special offers. Getting these little tips can mean the difference between proactive or reactionary approaches to competitor strategies.
PostRocket: In a nutshell, PostRocket is Buffer for Facebook. The app analyzes your Facebook page insights and picks optimal times to post your content with auto scheduler option. PostRocket offers optimization analysis that is easy to follow and more streamlined than basic Facebook Insights results. There is also a “SmartLink Converter” tool that posts your link in a photo format for greater visual engagement. PostRocket cuts down on the valuable time marketers devote to Facebook analysis and does some of the actual posting work too.
TweetWally: For companies that use blogging as a form of marketing, TweetWally literally does the writing. This app collects Tweets from company followers and formats them into a blog post on a particular topic or news event. This is helpful for hot, trending topics as well as the ones that traditionally hit home with customers or clients. A TweetWally blog post also provides a different dynamic to a blog that may have a standard look or style which makes it more engaging and fresh to visitors.
To save your business time and money in the long term, it is better to spend a little energy upfront and sign up for these inexpensive, and even free, apps. Existing technology is making it easier to take advantage of digital marketing. Let these apps work on your behalf and free up your staff for other more meaningful marketing tasks.
