How Much Time Do You Spend Online Each Day?

How much time do you spend online each day? 

If you do any marketing or professional promotions on line you know how time consuming it is.
 There is daily content to read about your industry and competitors, blogs to read (and write), Facebook posts, tweets to scroll through, and news sites to read. That is in addition to hundreds of emails that hit your inbox daily.  Sometimes it seems impossible to keep up with all the social media and technology that is essential if you want to be up to date with the latest business technology and use it to market your business. 

Many business owners are hiring staff to maintain their online presence and to keep their business relevant in the online world.  Others set aside a block of time each day to spend in the virtual world business world.  One thing is certain, in order to do business in the new economy you have to understand and be part of the ever- changing online world.

Here are some of the best sites to use to market your business and organize your on line presence:

§  Google+ Business Pages:  An excellent place to share new things that your are doing and to promote your business. Put the +1 button anywhere you'd like people to be able to recommend your business, products or services to friends and contacts all across the web.

§  Twitter:   You might already occasionally tweet about something happening during your business day, but did you know that your Twitter stream (those you follow) is an excellent way filter out the best blogs and articles.  By following people who are tweeting relevant information you have a constant stream of information including data and links to articles.

§  Twitter lists and Tweet Deck:  This is a dashboard application for managing your Twitter and Facebook accounts. Using columns to focus on the people that are tweeting out relevant information in your field you can find the information you need in a glance.  Remember to keep your lists short (no more than 75) with only the most informative and relevant sites.

§  Scoop.it:  Will identify great content that matches the interest of your audience.  It will  “scoop” articles from around the web that are relevant to my specific topic. Scoop.it  will send a daily email with a summary of some of the new articles uploaded to the boards you follow. If you only have 30 minutes each day to read the latest news in your industry, start with Scoop.it; it serves up the newest information in a very readable format.

§  Delicious:   This site will bookmark anything on the web that you want to remember and go back to. You can follow users or “stacks” (content-specific bookmarks) or search for information by tags.

§  Pinterest:   One of the newest social media platforms, it has become extremely popular very quickly.  If the content you want is visual, this is an ideal platform for you. You create topic specific boards and then pin relevant information to the board.  It seems everyone is using it.

§  Buzzfeed:  This is one of the hottest sites with the most social content on the web. They feature breaking buzz about the kinds of things you'd want to pass along to your customers and friends.  It is a great place to post your blog or new information about your business.