The popularity of social media has created a need for real-time search engines in order to aggregate and search for information. New platforms are coming up in answer to these needs.

In this article we will be covering 3 real-time search engines that might be useful in helping you to stay up to date with what’s happening in social media relevant to your marketing strategies.

OneRiot

OneRiot is currently the largest real-time search engine for Social Media. It aggregates popular topics from Twitter and other social media sites. Articles are consolidated into one headline that when clicked on brings up a variety articles within the topic. OneRiot indexes its search results according to their current relevance and popularity.

OneRiot will save you lots of time by not having to search through all the news sites to find the information you are looking for. Just search by a particular topic and OneRiot will return all the search results for that topic across the web in real-time.

As an example, if you sell watches, linking to OneRiot results page with the most current information on the types of watches you sell will instantly give your customers a resource to help them make their decision.

Collecta

Collecta monitors the update streams of news sites, popular blogs and social media, and Flickr, so it will show you results as they happen.

If you like to keep up with important news stories as they are happening, then Collecta is for you because it will aggregate news stories by topic and then suggest three sources to give you the breadth of angles on a particular news story.

48ers

48ers is a social search engine that scans Facebook, Twitter and Digg for conversations. The site is great if you are searching for keywords and want to see what people are discussing about within a certain topic.

Some ways 48ers could be useful:

• You can track what people are saying about your company or brand across major social sites from one interface.

• You can engage your audience by using the sharing functionality directly from within the 48ers’ interface.

• You can build an audience by tracking what is being said about them in real time and respond accordingly.

These are a few of the real-time social media search engines that we have come across. Let us know if you use them too and how it’s benefited you. If you’re using a different social media search engine, let us know what it is and how it has helped you to manage all the information that is out there in the social media world.

Social media and social networking gives business owners the opportunity to reach a larger audience at a low or no cost aside from the time spent networking.

As business owners we’re always looking to find ways to maintain our social media presence as efficiently as possible whilst still allowing us time to manage our other business activities. Below are 7 time saving tips we would like to share with you that might help you save time and create an effective social media marketing plan.

1. Understand your purpose and have a plan

Before jumping into social media set aside some time to think about specifically what you hope to get out of it. Perhaps it’s to increase traffic to your website, gain brand recognition or to maintain relations with your customers. Since time is limited it’s important to know what your purpose is, how you will approach it.

2. Understand what social media is all about

It’s important to understand what social media is, learn the etiquette and the do’s and don’ts before jumping in. You don’t want to create a negative image for your brand. Take the time to get familiar with the various social media sites, connect with other users and learn how the sites work. One of the biggest mistakes is to jump into social media and start promoting your product or service right off the bat. This will tend to create the impression that you’re only interested in selling and not the conversation or the people who are following you.

3. Targeting specific sites

Another common mistake new users make is to sign up for an account on as many social media sites they can find. You’ll never be able to keep up with all of them and you’ll be spreading yourself too thin. Focus on a just a few sites and plan to be an active and consistent user. You’ll see far greater results!

4. Use Twitter

Twitter is a great way to connect with your target audience with fast and instant results if you have a product launch, event, teleclass, etc and need to market it to a large group quickly. Being active on Twitter doesn’t mean you need to create an account and follow a lot of people or send out tweets about anything and everything. Start by following people and replying to their tweets, start conversations, see who’s following them and if they fit in your target audience/niche follow them. When you have a new product/service/blog posting share it with your followers. As you make more connections and gain influence your results will improve by generating more traffic to your website or clicks to your links.

5. Target niche-specific social media sites

Niche-specific social media sites are on the increase and these sites provide a smaller community of targeted people that you can get your content to. You’ll find a higher percentage of people on these sites will fall into your target market and produce greater results.

6. Cultivate your network

Your network determines the success of your social media marketing. Get to know people in your niche, see who is promoting their content, and reach out to them about the possibility of helping each other.

7. Schedule times for social media

The best way to manage social media is to schedule a set block of time to use social media. It could be 30 minutes a day or 3 times a week. By having set times it can help you to keep your usage down and still be active. Once you decide what’s right for you stick to it!

Do you currently have social media marketing methods that you use to help you save time and still be an active member of the social media community? If so, we would love to hear what works for you!