As a coach would you like to keep an active social media presence but you’re finding that it saps your time, or you find you just cant keep up with the ever changing technology and all the tools, techniques and etiquette associated with it. There’s been lots of opinions floating around the net about outsourcing social media some for and against outsourcing, in my opinion you can successfully outsource some aspects of your social media activities and the key to achieving this is your partnership/relationship with person you’ve choosen to outsource to ie A Virtual Assistant. There are lots good reasons to get additional support for your social media efforts by outsourcing some of the work – from set-up and design, to ongoing technical assistance and content creation. It’s very easy for your social media marketing to take a back burner if you try to handle it all yourself and for that reason outsourcing is beneficial.

Relationship

The number one thing you cannot outsource is your online relationships you truly need to engage with the people within your networks. Your virtual assistant can implement the technical and administrative tasks allowing you to have the time to focus on building relationships yourself. A virtual assistant is your value added team member to contribute and support you streamline your activities but not impersonate you and a successful outsourcing of social media marketing requires active partnering and participation from you alongside your virtual assistant allowing you to be authentic.

What to Outsource The Role of Your Virtual Assistant

•Social network profile setup and management

•Setup your profile on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

•Branding Design for Facebook Pages and Twitter backgrounds – Having a branded profile page on Twitter and Facebook (and YouTube) sets your business apart and creates a consistency to your company’s brand. The added polish of custom graphics on your Facebook Fan Page wall and landing page tab, along with a custom Twitter and YouTube page reinforces your branding efforts.

•Pre-scheduled 5-10 marketing Tweets per week via Hootsuite or Social Oomph

•Writing of Tweets and Facebook event notifications and useful links and questions to fans for engagement

•Setup and connection of the automated functions in Facebook & Twitter

•Finding targeted people to follow and friend

•Deleting unnecessary DMs in Twitter and spammy messages in Facebook

•and more its depend on your type of business and your goals for using social media

Social Media Activities That You Can Do Yourself

•Do your usual conversational Tweets. Choose at least 30 minutes to an hour day spliting it in two for morning /evening or afternoon go into your accounts manually and have something to say to add to a conversation, or add an original update from you.

•Replying to messages on Facebook

•Replying to @ replies on Twitter

•Answering DMs (direct messages) on Twitter

•Making recommendations or answering questions on LinkedIn

The Benefits of Outsourcing your social media

•Efficiency: If you are new to social media – or ready to embark on a broader social media strategy – outsourcing can get things up and running quickly.

•Experience: You’ll also benefit from your virtual assistants experience with other clients. This will allow you to avoid pitfalls and learn about options and alternatives.

•Synergy: An experienced virtual assistant will be able to create integrated system of social media tools and channels, allowing you to maximize your social media presence for greater impact.

•Branding: You want to select a virtual assistant with marketing and design capabilities in addition to social media know-how. The right virtual assistant will make sure that everything you do supports your overall marketing strategy, including branding and identity.

•Strategy: Your virtual assistant can help you develop a strategy and keep you focused on achieving long-term goals.