Just so you know, I may earn money or products from the companies mentioned in this post. I have a full affiliate disclosure that you can find here.

“Getting an audience is hard. Sustaining an audience is hard. It demands a consistency of thought, of purpose and of action over a long period of time.”

Bruce Springsteen

The number one struggle that I hear fellow small business owners or direct sellers in Full of Grit & Grace is with consistency. How can I be more consistent with my social media presence? How in the world do you stay consistent on Facebook etc. while dealing with health issues?

I wish there was a magic key! Or, at least one simple thing that I could share with you to help you keep a consistent presence on your chosen social media platform(s) without much effort. The reality is, the “Boss” aka Bruce Springsteen had it right when he said ”Getting an audience is hard. Sustaining an audience is hard. It demands a consistency of thought, of purpose and of action over a long period of time.”

Yes, I know he was talking about music, but it actually applies to social media and customer relationships perfectly as well. While I don’t have a magic key, I do have some strategies that help me to stay consistent for my own social media marketing (and for my clients).

Increasing Your Consistency on Social Media for your Business

#1 Prioritize Ruthlessly: Is what you’re working on helping to further your goals (business or personal)? Will what is on your to-do list today help you succeed? If you’re reading this blog and you’re looking to be more consistent online, then yes, hopefully it does! If you’re spending hours (or even 10 minutes) mindlessly scrolling Facebook because you have a social media based business, then no, that isn’t furthering your goals.

Spending time interacting with others on social media as a business owner or direct seller is critical, but you have to be very careful about how you spend it. Set a timer for yourself, or block off a certain part of your day, to mindfully engage with friends, customers, teammates, etc. on your social media. Do not waste precious time or energy scrolling without a purpose!

This same methodology applies to any business or personal tasks. I can get a better return on investment with my time and energy by working for an hour than I can by going to the grocery store (plus, I totally hate it). So grocery shopping is something my husband does (and he doesn’t even mind). Do I do tasks that I’d prefer not to do? Of course! But, I’m very mindful with how I spend my energy. I do the most critical/have to be done today tasks first thing each day, then I move on to checking emails etc., working on things that are important but not critical, and so on.

If I can make a task easier on myself (physically or mentally), I usually do. For example, I schedule most of my Instagram posts and Pins to Pinterest using Tailwind, because I can schedule them out for a month and then not have to stress about it (you may find me browsing Pinterest on a Friday night, but that’s for pure enjoyment lol!). I also use Tailwind to optimize my Instagram hashtags, and it saves me a great amount of time that I used to spend researching trending posts.

I understand that you can’t always outsource tasks or make them more efficient, but prioritizing ruthlessly by what is most important will help you to get more done each day. Want my free checklist to help you prioritize ruthlessly? Get it here!

If you need help reclaiming your schedule and your time, I highly recommend this free download. You may find that you’re doing tasks that don’t need to be done at all!

#2 Identify your target audience: You may have heard me say this before, but if you don’t know who you’re talking to, then what the heck you should say to them regularly is going to be much more difficult. If you’re trying to speak to the millions of people that could buy your product or service, instead of the people who actually will, you’re making writing consistent posts a lot harder on yourself.

Plus, you’re missing out on the opportunity to work with Facebook or Instagram’s algorithim. By understanding exactly who you’re target audience is, you’ll know what keywords, images, and pain points they identify with. These keywords are extremely important, because including these keywords in your posts will actually tell the algorithim who to show your posts to. If you haven’t defined your target audience yet, I recommend this course: MDS210 Target Audience.

Work Smarter, Not Harder On Your Business.

#3 Have a Plan. I tried to think of different ways to say ‘have a marketing plan for your business’ that sounded fancier or sparklier, but I got nothing. Sorry, friends! Having a plan isn’t super fun or sparkly (ok, it is if you’re excited by planning like I am!), but it is a key way to be more consistent in your business.

Planning for your business, at the very least a big picture plan for a few months at a time, is a huge timesaver. Plus, I can tell you from experience with large and small clients, planning always leads to more success (even if you decide to deviate from the plan later on).

How can you plan for your small business when your life and health is super inconsistent (like mine is)? The key to planning for me is having a plan that is flexible. Plus, it’s extremely important for me to plan time for self-care, and rest. What else do I always plan for? Well, I plan for not feeling well enough to work. That probably sounds strange to the average healthy person who can push through a cold etc., but chronic illness is a different beast and pushing through isn’t usually what’s best for me. You have to do what’s best for you, but no matter what you face in life, it’s always good to have a back up, just in case.

Whether your kids are off school for snow in March, or your best friend needs help unexpectedly, having a plan allows you to do what you need to do and stay consistent in your business. If you’ve never created a plan for your business before, or you have but you don’t have days to spend doing it, I highly recommend asking for help.

Join us for a Q2 Planning Webinar that will help you create a plan that works for you and your business, and will teach you a vital communication strategy for customers, with follow up email templates too. It will also help you with finances and more! Click here to read all of the info.

4. Repurpose Your Content: Trying to come up with new content every single day for use on your business page, your personal page, your Facebook group, etc. is exhausting. Plus, it’s totally unneccessary! You can effeciently re-use your content for different platforms, or share the exact same information in a new way.

For example, pretend you sell earrings and your Target Audience loves learning about new fashion trends. You can share a blog your wrote (or found) on your Facebook business page about what’s hot for spring fashion. Then, you can make a poll in your Facebook group comparing different hot new styles and asking your group members to vote on their favorite. Same content, multiple ways of sharing it.

Spending too much time looking for great content to share with your Target Audience? Prioritize ruthlessly and make it easier on yourself! Like other business pages with a similar target audience and utilize your Facebook business page’s news feed. You can share their content if you give them credit or you can re-create it with your own spin! You can watch my video on how to do that here.

If you want more tips on how to repurpose your content, check out this blog post from my friend Michele M. Bradley!

5. Consistency is a Netflix marathon, not a commercial. True business success, and consistency on social media take time to build. You won’t completely change your business by posting every day for a week. And if you post daily for 3 months, and then you miss a week, you haven’t ruined all of your hard work. Will your engagement drop after a short hiatus? Maybe. Will your business be doomed? No! Just like eating a donut after a week of eating low-carb won’t ruin your entire diet, missing a post here or there isn’t going to ruin your business.

Want to be more consistent in your business? Focus on prioritizing what’s important, quit multi-tasking (there are tons of studies saying how it is actually far less effective for productivity), and work smarter with the ideas I shared above. Overall, remember to give yourself some grace and don’t waste any time beating yourself up over things you did not do, and focus on what you can and have accomplished!

What helps YOU to be more consistent with your business and social media presence?