Hopefully, this post will help you have a thriving social media ministry, even with limited time. Maybe walking you through some things I do will help you have an engaging social media presence without “breaking the bank” on your time budget.

I’ll be using the imagery of logging into social media as similar to entering a party in full swing (see part one in this series).

Automatic Posting

I’ll write once on WordPress and yet my content goes out to at least six different places. My blogs post automatically to Facebook (in several locations), to Twitter, and to LinkedIn as well as to an email letter sent through MailChimp, so I have immediate content on these sites without even peeking in the door. People know, however, if you’re only doing automatic posting. You still need to go in to see if people are “liking” your posts or to respond to comments.

Use a Social Media Dashboard

In part one of this series, I recommended you sign up for HootSuite to manage your separate accounts in one place.  (HootSuite is free for up to five social media accounts). Personally, I usually go directly to Facebook for my engagement there. I use HootSuite for 75% of my Tweets and for 10% of my Facebook activity.  I use HootSuite only for gathering information from LinkedIn and MailChimp. I also have a Facebook page for eQuipping for eMinistry (e4e) and a closed group for e4e that I’m slowly starting to manage more often in HootSuite.

Normally, I check Twitter on HootSuite about once per week and spend just ten minutes scheduling tweets (with some of these also going to Facebook). You could easily schedule Facebook or LinkedIn conversations in HootSuite.

Visit Regularly

Pick one social media account to be your main one. Check in regularly there and occasionally elsewhere. “Regularly” may be once on the weekend or once or twice a day.

Filter Who You’ll Visit

Facebook and Twitter lists will also help you filter who you want to talk to. Using lists, you could go straight to the room where the relatives are chatting or run over to a different room where your financial partners are gathered. Check on these people more often. You can also change your Facebook status to send it only to a particular list. Just remember to change your status back to “Public” for your next update.  (Learn about Facebook lists).

I keep the Facebook chat “off” to limit distractions, but you might like to have yours on so you can grab a quick conversation with someone when they’re online. I still can see who’s online, which has been a big help so I can phone that person right away or arrange for a phone call later.

What do you do to manage your social media time and still connect with people?

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Visit the Table of Contents for the You-Can-Too series posts. This post is the second in the social media series.  Keep following the series for posts on databases, communication, websites, and social media.

NOTES:

• Re-read part one of this series, Why Have Several Social Media Accounts? to help you think through which social media accounts you should have. Sign up for HootSuite, too, to manage Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, WordPress, MailChimp, LinkedIn, RSS feeds, and more.
• You might also like to read the article, Choosing Social Media Platforms.
• The photo of the portable sundial is on Wikimedia Commons, which describes the Horus sundial as an “engraved brass horizontal sundial [which] corrects for latitude, time zone, daylight savings time, longitude, and equation of time; with magnetic declination correction and spirit levels.”  I’m impressed!