Social Media and You

A circus is the best metaphor for the state of social media marketing currently.

There are three rings, of course, for the Big Three platforms; endlessly entertaining feats of technical acrobatics, and the madly inventive clowns keeping us entranced. There are the marketing fillies and stallions; blogging monkeys; elephantine Amazons and Wikipedias; and spammy mice scuttling everywhere.

The circus scene boggles a kid’s mind. Interfacing with the web, we’re all kids at a circus. Many of us, much of the time, fall into P.T. Barnum’s famous ‘sucker’ classification, letting the lures and wiles of the circus substitute for true productivity.

Drilling down to what is authentically relevant and useful to your particular situation requires patience, skill, and experience.

Often people contact me wanting a blog or Facebook Business Page or website because other people have told them they should have one. But they have no idea how to use these tools; they don’t know what they don’t know about social media; and just like circus-goers, they’re reacting to the press of the crowd rather than looking out for their best interests.

Want to start up your online marketing? Get a professional to help you. Don’t run away with the circus.

In the ‘Why didn’t I think of that?’ category, kudos to Starbucks for innovations that might impress any marketing mastermind. Get a load of this article about the launch of Starbucks’ own  Digital Network.

Their concept – offering a select (and hotly popular) set of internet picks, free for the taking when on site (when they’d usually cost the viewer at least some pittance) –  is brilliant. It’s a marketing gimmick, a free plastic toy to beat all and to please all, as well. As the cited article’s author says, “Imagine a customer-only network chock full of ‘In Network’ freebies that you can ONLY get while on ‘location’ …  Free access to premium news sites such as the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, free iTunes downloads, and for the kids free access to Nick Jr. games that typically require monthly fees.”

Talk about no-brainers. The cheap and easy value-add boosts Starbucks’ appeal astronomically. This is at least as phenomenal as Facebook Places, IMHO, though it approaches the wooing of customers from a different angle. While Facebook Places distinguishes a business establishment through its visits from individuals, the Starbucks initiative wins customers through the irresistibly of its personality.

A fascinating dichotomy, n’est-ce-pas?

One thing about the web and social media: you have to continuously be ready to try new things.

Dealing with changes has become a challenge for my old bones. Still, I know flexibility is of the essence.  (Yoga is a great way to stay in shape for it, by the way.)

Participating with the likes of Facebook will drive you straight to hell’s precipice in terms of adapting to change. Not to mention endless innovations at any site you frequent, or tool you use, search engine technology, or whatever, will keep you spinning.

Building websites is especially demanding of your flexibility factor. Can you instantly comprehend your client’s tastes, needs, and options,  making intelligent recommendations in those areas based on your client’s completely individual situation juxtaposed upon the immense array of available resources?

It’s all about being nimble, and light, refining your practice into increasingly skilled listening, so that your product on behalf of the client can be efficiently created and targeted.

The internet challenges us, big time. Not everyone is up to its demands, and no one is up to its demands all the time.  Sigh. No sense trying to be perfect, I guess. Just go with the flow.

So what do you think of Facebook’s switch to narrower tab pages? Heretofore, we could use a 700+ pixel-wide table and our tabs showed as simple pages without sidebars. As of next Monday, sidebars will show on either side of every 520 pixel-wide tab page.

Facebook mumbles something about how this will make navigation easier, but obviously it’s to increase their available ad space, right? I’m wondering why this isn’t being discussed; perhaps you can enlighten me.

Fact is, it’s a little disturbing that Facebook feels compelled to change the rules on us so often. I’m not opposed to change, but from a marketing and public relations standpoint, I’m beginning to think Facebook is dangerously pushing their luck.

The news lately has talked about a phenomenon in corporate economics in which an organization is too big to fail. Does Facebook count itself amongst these behemoths?

Certainly, reputation loudly proclaims that the company – particularly its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg – couldn’t care less about the software’s users. Considering that we pay nary a cent for using it, we can hardly complain. And Facebook substitutes are not easy to imagine.

It’s fascinating how the tail is wagging the dog, don’t you think?

The two are so closely related that it’s hard to distinguish between them, sometimes. But actually, they differ in important ways. Important, that is, if you’re wondering how to sell your products / services online.

Social media is a sub-set of inbound marketing. It’s much easier to understand and manipulate than inbound marketing. Social media is to inbound marketing what a rowboat is to an ocean vessel.

It’s like writing a letter, versus developing an entire postal service.

What you consider to be social media may range from a narrow perspective, in which only the networks of Twitter-Facebook-LinkedIn and such are included, to a broad definition inclusive of almost anything about your business that exists on the internet.

Perhaps social media goes even further than that, extending to in-person meet-ups and Foursquare events.

Social media is a set of tools.

Inbound marketing is a state of mind.

Inbound marketing is about moving beyond a competitive economy to a branded one, where value is derived from observed behaviors and relationships that are relatively personal.

(Traditional business values subliminal seduction through mass communications.)

Social media’s easy. Inbound marketing’s hard.  It’s tough to teach: it begs intuitive understanding.

More to come on this.

“Strive for perfection but don’t wait for it.”

(Perhaps this post  belongs on my other blog, but it’s here now, and so it goes.)

• Talking about Michael Gerber’s challenges in his E-Myth in my local networking group. Create the perfect system.
• Thinking about Valeria Maltoni’s weekly Tweetchat on Kaizen. Perfectibility as work/lifestyle.
• Loving the work I do, helping people express their brands online. And thinking how vast the field is.

I want to reject Gerber’s ideas, because they’re contrary to an artisan approach. But I know that the truth is, though he leans to the right, Gerber’s got a point. Whether you expect to incorporate your business or remain a tradesperson, your search for perfectibility is paramount. Your progress in perfectibility is the yardstick of success.

When you give things an Oriental slant, seeing work as practice in the slow patience of a belief system, the ugly edge of mechanism is softened. It’s not robotic, it’s devotional.

But really it’s the mere fact of the ‘net that forces us to work smarter, right? The vastness of it.

The reality that we have this tool for discovery of self and other that lets us envision a perfection heretofore unimaginable.

You may have heard the observation that the web’s divided between content-producers, commenters, and lurkers. Relatively few people want to spend any of their time producing content; not many are willing even to compose a comment.

Therefore, although inbound marketing and social media are key strategies for every business, it is not to be assumed that the business owner is the Voice of their online presence.

If you run a business but don’t wish to be a content producer for the internet, what are your choices? I’ll offer just a few basic solutions here.

1. Get a digital voice recorder and talk into it. Let your virtual assistant transcribe and upload.
2. Identify someone in your company who can be trusted to take on the role.
3. Organize your company so that all workers share in the demands of online responsiveness.
4. Work with a social media assistant who can help you devise the best solutions for your specific situation.

Generous sharing of knowledge is what you are doing online, demonstrating sufficient personal investment to win your visitors’ trust.

Your internet Voice has to be real and honest, but it does not have to be your own Voice or nothing.

Social media gurus make a big deal about being authentic, as the best way to create your most effective online presence.

There’s a general consensus that you should be as You as possible, liberally sharing your personality. Gary Vaynerchuk-style.  Or Hugh MacLeod.

Many stand firmly behind the notion that all updates must be your own expressions, that anything ghost- or staff-written on the internet is bogus.

The relative raw immediacy of social media may be one reason why people want online exchanges to be transparent.  Relationships formed online are vulnerable to suspicion and mistrust. You have to overdo it in the transparency department if you’re going to be believed.

But if we relegate the web only to those who are capable of regularly expressing themselves there, it won’t be of much use. The internet is truly for everyone; businesses of all kinds have to be able to use it profitably. It’s not just for coaches and authors and marketers: it’s not only for language-oriented types.

So the voice of your business online becomes a critical question. If it is not to be your voice, whose voice can it authentically, transparently, and powerfully be? Next post, we’ll look at some possibilities.

You may have encountered them: the rockstars, the early internet adopters who have attained worldwide fame. Guy Kawasaki, MenWithPens, @ pistachio, Chris Brogan, Gary Vaynerchuk, Liz Strauss, Loic LeMeur … and maybe a couple dozen more. Not to mention luminaries like Mitch Joel, Clay Shirky, Seth Godin.

These people are exceptional, it’s sure. Their brilliance is remarkable. In every field, wherever we fixate our interest, we look for the finest, the best example, the cutting edge. To seek out, label, and celebrate the stars is human nature, and an admirable urge.

But this doesn’t diminish the reality that social media is the antithesis of star-crossed culture. Online, value is constantly shifting, and can’t be permanently placed anywhere. That which is revered today will be archival in a minute, so don’t take pride in any fleeting glory. Online, your personal glory is not the point, and if you persist in promoting it, you will fail. Online, you win trust, a commodity more precious than mere love.

A rockstar is to be adored, but not necessarily trusted. Inbound marketing and online social media are leveling, democratizing forces. They are the opposite of star-making culture.  Online, opportunity is equal; we are all rockstars.

Continuing from previous posting on uses of Facebook for business, we can list various reasons you might return to visit a company’s Business Page, after you’ve Liked it:

• offer a testimonial;
• respond when XYZ Company asks you to respond;
• participate in a contest, drawing, or special event;
• you’re curious about what others have to say about XYZ Company;
• you want to share a personal story that’s relevant to XYZ Co.

While these motivations may be shoe-ins for larger companies, small and itty bizzes may doubt that they can garner significant numbers these ways.

However, this viewpoint is skewed: it assesses FB as an optional vehicle, as if it were one of many choices. But actually, it’s the whole banana. Like the phone, you don’t have a choice whether or not to use it. FB’s a unique and necessary tool, not a fashion statement.

If you offer your FB Business Page as a service, rather than as messaging from you, its use may become more clear. It’s there

• to receive testimonials;
• to listen to your market;
• to reward your market;
• to enlist your market in doing good things;
• to be transparent.