Many business owners struggle to find time to engage on social media and feed the blog. This is especially true for companies in a seasonal business. When the phones start ringing and everyone is working overtime, it’s hard to carve out even 15  minutes a day for online marketing

Unfortunately, when you’re busy is when you need it the most. When the phones are ringing and people are in buying mode, you need to be where the people are. The simple answer is to get up 30 minutes early. Just hop out of bed and spend time before your coffee to  hop on social media, respond and interact. The simple answer is simple for anyone who doesn’t actually have a busy season.

A more realistic approach

The trick is to take advantage of the slow times. So if you are a retail store gearing up for the holiday season, or a landscape company slowing down as the days get shorter, here are a few ideas to keep you content marketing program going strong all year round:

  1. Plan ahead. Things are a little quiet this afternoon? Write a few blog posts that will be topical during your peak season, schedule them to run when you know you will be too busy to write something new. Now you have fuel for your social media.
  2. Schedule status updates. This isn’t permission to completely automate you social activity. However, having a few general interest posts you can intersperse with the real-time updates on Facebook or Twitter will keep you in front of prospects when they are ready to buy.
  3. Find relevant guest bloggers. If you run a plumbing company, reach out to a carpet cleaning company, real estate agent or insurance broker. Each of these companies target the same customers you do, but probably have a slightly different busy season. Invite them to write a homeowner tips article during your busy season, and then write one for them during  your slow season. Not only do you get good content which is relevant and interesting to your readers, you have someone else vested in sharing the content on their social media channels, expanding your reach.

If you are looking at this list and thinking you never slow down enough to do this, you need to look at where you are spending your time. Are all your activities really working for you? Cut out something that isn’t really adding value and make room in your schedule for something which will.

The other option, if you are looking at your schedule and there really is no room even in the slow time, this is an indication you are ready to grow. That growth can be in the form of a new employee or an outside resource, but making time for marketing when you are  most busy  helps you stay that way.

photo credit: Ben124. via photopin cc