Marketing overwhelm is real, and all too common. This entrepreneurship game is a marathon, not a sprint, so it’s imperative that we learn how to market our businesses without wearing ourselves out. Here are three tips.
You know the feeling. After finally finishing that blog post that you wanted to get done last week, you sit down to crank out your daily posts for Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Once that’s done, you set up a cute Instagram shot, write a personal story and hashtags to go along with it, and after all that you realize you really ought to brainstorm a quick tip video to put on your YouTube channel which hasn’t had a new video in months. By the time you finish everything, you drop onto your bed exhausted thinking, “Now I still have all my client work to do?”
This feeling is called marketing overwhelm. It’s very real – and very common.
So what’s the solution? How can we focus our efforts so that consistently and effectively marketing our businesses without going completely mad? I hope the following three smart tips will help.
Smart Tip #1: Don’t try to do it all.
There are literally an infinite amount of ways you COULD market your business, and not every method will be right for you. For example, for the time being, I’ve realized it’s not feasible for me to have a real presence on Instagram or Twitter – I simply don’t have the bandwidth. And that’s ok.
As you begin to amp up your marketing efforts, start small. People often ask me: “Janelle, how do you do it all? You do so much marketing!” And the answer is, when I first starting marketing my business, I started really small. I committed to sending out just one email to my list once a week. Then, once I’d developed the habit of doing that consistently, I added a weekly blog. And so on and so on. Start small and build from there to avoid marketing overwhelm.
Smart Tip #2: Create a schedule.
When I say schedule I’m not referring to when your marketing content hits the world – I’m talking about when and how you create it. The more structure we have around both WHEN we create our marketing content, and also the TOPICS on which we write (or speak) – the more likely it is that we’ll get things done.
Get specific on when you want to create your content each week. Is it Fridays from 9 am to 1 pm? Or is spread out over the week for one hour each morning? Through a little trial and error, you can find a schedule that works for you.
And here’s a hot tip: generating a big list of topic ideas a couple of times a year will save you lots of time. That way, when it’s time to write that email or that blog post, you won’t have to spend time brainstorming a topic. You’ll be ready to go.
Smart Tip #3: Automation is your friend.
Schedule that blog post to publish on the same day each week. Use tools like Buffer to pre-schedule your social media posts. If you’re using MailChimp, Constant Contact, or the like – schedule your emails again, to go out on the same day every week. This both allows you to be consistent for your audience so they know when they’re going to hear from you, and also to be able to work on your own schedule.
Looking for more burnout tips?
For more from Janelle (hey that’s me!) at Ellanyze on avoiding entrepreneurial burnout, you also might enjoy:
Self Care for Entrepreneurs: Build a Business That Takes Care of YOU
Zoom Fatigue: Why it Happens & How to Beat it Once And For All
