Twitter Facebook LinkedIn Flipboard 2 Let’s face it—done correctly, social media can be a total time suck. Have you ever been curating content, doing research or sifting through posts or comments on Facebook or Twitter, then look up to see that hours have passed? Yup that Internet rabbit hole happens to us, too. To be successful with your social media community management, it helps to be super organized. Really awesome tools help, too. My team is super smart when it comes to using and experimenting with productivity tools, and we thought we’d share some with you here. 1. Use The Right Social Media Tools. There are tons of social media tools and dashboards that will help streamline your social media community management. Here are some of our favorites: Buffer. Buffer is a wonderful time saver. It allows users to compile a list of content they want to share and then have the app post it at optimal times based on when your audience is most active. Buffer allows customized scheduling options, multiple social media accounts and detailed analytics you can use. And Buffer has one of the finest teams of not only senior leadership, but customer service reps as well. They are flat out awesome in every way. Hootsuite. With more than 7 million users, Hootsuite is one of the more popular social media management tools. With a Hootsuite dashboard, you can monitor brand mentions, schedule tweets and manage multiple accounts. We use the HootSuite Pro service and manage multiple accounts for multiple clients with ease. The biggest selling point for Hootsuite is their reporting capabilities, which makes clients happy, which makes me happy. You can always buy bigger, better, fancier tools, but this one is not only awesome, it’s very affordable. Google Analytics. Obviously Google Analytics in general is important, but using it to set goals and track goals and conversions is also important—and something that many people overlook. Do it. Now. Also, if you have an ecommerce site, enable Google Analytics Social – the data you’ll get as a result will make you want to buy me a dozen cupcakes. Also, from a very basic standpoint, using Google Analytics to analyze the efficacy of your blog content should be at the top of your list. 2. Get Bliss for Easy Control. You’ll want to kiss us for pointing you to Bliss Control for your account settings. It’s a one-stop shop that allows users to manage their social network settings. Unlike the tools previously mentioned, Bliss Control only deals with account settings. You can change profile pictures, update bios, change passwords, recover passwords and more for the following networks: Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Pinterest, Tumblr, Foursquare, YouTube, LinkedIn, Google+, Meetup, Path, Instagram and Flickr. Awesome, no? 3. Manage Content With LikeHack. We curate a ton of content and one of our favorite tools is LikeHack. It’s is a neat tool that creates aggregated news and content feeds by: Extracting content from news feeds Extracting content that you’ve liked or shared Collecting your content in one place LikeHack supports Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, RSS, Google Reader imports and more. It’s an easy and efficient way to find quality content and make the curation (and even the ideation) processes less painful. 4. Use An Editorial Calendar. Moving away from the spreadsheet and into a full-blown editorial calendar is one of the best moves you can make. It’ll help ensure that your content marketing efforts (blog and/or social media channels) are aligned, that your messaging makes sense and allow you to track ideas, assignments, deadlines, publication dates and even results. We use DivvyHQ, although there are other editorial calendar solutions out there, and some that I’m sure are terrific. Divvy is a content and production workflow tool that will definitely get you organized. Its functionality includes: Automated emails to remind you of any content that’s due; A Parking Lot feature that allows you to save your ideas and content topics for future use; A calendar that’s easy to use (and export if you need it). 5. Browse, Baby, Browse. Oh, and More is Better. When it comes to browsers, more is definitely better. Open your social media networks/tools in a separate browser. This is an easy trick that will save some much-needed time. During your workday, we recommend you have two browsers: one for social media only and one for your other work. Having multiple windows open at once can be confusing and make it harder to find what you’re looking for. Of course, this does not apply to me because I have 47 browser tabs open, on multiple browsers, at any one time. 6. Ever in Love with Evernote. We don’t know anybody who doesn’t love Evernote – but if you’ve not yet experimented with it, consider this your nudge. Evernote will help organize your notes, bookmark web pages and keep up with your to-do lists. What’s cool about Evernote is that it syncs with all your devices (desktop, phone, tablet, etc.) so you’ll always have access to your information. When it comes to productivity and organization, there are few things better. There are also some awesome IFTTT recipes you can use to connect with Evernote, so check those out as well. 7. AbleBits for Repetitive Tasks. It’s kind of geeky, but another tool that will help with non-social media related items is AbleBits. It’s a true time saver that offers add-ons to Microsoft Word, Outlook, Outlook Express and Excel. Some of the coolest features include: Auto BCC/CC for Outlook – This allows users to automatically BCC (blind carbon copy) themselves on outgoing messages. It also allows you to CC others, say if you need to include your boss or other team members on your emails. This add-on prevents you from entering single email addresses over and over. Reply to Outlook emails with templates – If you find yourself typing the same text repeatedly in emails, you should take advantage of this add-on, which will save you the trouble and extra typing. You can instantly reply to an email with a template and create multiple templates. If you’re not crazy about Microsoft Excel, AbleBits also offers tons of add-ons that will make your life easier while navigating spreadsheets. So, now you know about some of our favorite productivity tools – what are yours? photo credit: justin_levy via photopin cc Twitter Tweet Facebook Share Email This article was written for Business 2 Community by Shelly Kramer.Learn how to publish your content on B2C Author: Shelly Kramer Follow @ShellyKramer Shelly Kramer is the Co-CEO of V3 Broadsuite, a marketing agency specializing in the digital space. A 20+ year marketing veteran, she's a brand strategist focused on delivering integrated marketing solutions and helping businesses leverage the web for growth and profitability. She's an expert at content strategy and execution… View full profile ›More by this author:Social Media Marketing: You Get What You PayHow Behavior [and Intuitive Apps] Are Driving Mobile SearchWant to Engage With Millennials? Don’t Forget to Email Them