VA Toolbox: Tools to help you “batch”

Have you heard of a word “batching”? When you try to maximize your time, it very often saves time to do work by batching similar tasks together. For example, you may want to block a time to concentrate on your social media efforts, handling your emails, etc.

With the technology today, it’s possible to do batch many common tasks. For example, I often write emails that need to go out on certain dates. What I do instead of writing those emails when they have to go out, I write some of them in advance and schedule them to go out on certain dates/times. Same with my blog articles. Here are some of the tools that I use to make batching possible:

Blog Platforms
Many blog platforms allow you to schedule exactly when your blog entry gets published. I normally write a blog entry (I use WordPress.), then schedule it to get published to suit my needs. For example, I normally schedule to publish my article right before my newsletter goes out so that my newsletter subscribers will be able to follow the link to read the full article at the right timing.

Email Tools
I use Outlook as my main email client, and I can easily schedule future email deliveries. The only problem is that my PC needs to be up and running when the scheduled emails go out. I also use Gmail to handle one email account that I have with one of my clients’ domain. I love Gmail for various reasons, but it does not offer any future delivery scheduling functions.

Then I recently came across a great free service that solves both problems above. It’s called LetterMeLater.com (http://www.lettermelater.com/). It does not only let you schedule emails within their interface but also allows you to schedule and send out emails from your own email client by using a special lettermelater address. For me, this service comes in quite handy.

Social Media Tools
There are several tools out there that let you schedule your tweets/status updates, but by far, my favorite is HootSuite (http://www.hootsuite.com/). HootSuite’s other handy features include updating your status on multiple social media sites, letting you see what people are saying about you or anybody you specify, and much more. It’s such a time saver and, oh so user-friendly, too!

Happy batching!