Social media is a fad. False.
Social media is a waste of time. False.
Social media is changing the core of our communication. It’s a revolution. True.
For some reason, I have no idea why actually, people still think that social media is a confusing mess and waste of time. I still hear that from time to time from business owners and it really baffles me to be honest.
I understand that it’s different. I get that it’s new. I also get that people resist change. And here’s the thing. To me, that’s the real reason they won’t accept it. Let me tell you a little story of how I hated social media.
Back in MySpace Days
When MySpace was around, well, when they were THE place to be, I was resisting it. I too thought it was a waste of time. I thought it would phase out…and I was right. About MySpace. What I didn’t realize was that the world was changing before our eyes and communication as we knew it would never be the same again.
I distinctly remember that I never setup an account on that particular social media site…but I did have one. My girlfriend at the time (my wife now) setup an account for me and ran two accounts, hers and mine. So I had a presence on there that I never even knew what was going on. Which is interesting because I think that is exactly where many business owners are today.
Your Brand Is Online
It’s time to get your head out of the sand and realize that you’re being talked about. I’m not sure if your ears are burning or anything, but you’re being talked about…somewhere.
You have a profiles on review sites that you aren’t even monitoring. You’ve got blog posts about you that you’ve never read. Heck, you’ve got people telling their entire Facebook or Twitter following how awesome you are…and how awesome you’re not.
Yeah, So What?
Imagine that you did something great for a customer and they went online and shared that experience with all their “friends” or “followers” or whatever.
What if that person had a blog with 20,000 monthly readers?
What if their twitter following was 100,000+?
What if that review you just got was negative?
That could be seriously detrimental to your customers and future business. No, not could be…it would be.
You see, our communication is not really all that different than it used to be. We still talk and share experiences. The difference is that we all now have a megaphone, instead of a telephone. I mean, party lines in the past allowed for multiple people to talk…but beyond that, you’d have to be in a group of people physically to get a mass message out. That’s just not so anymore.
So That’s What
You might want to consider getting ahold on your brand’s online presence. I would highly suggest you signup for Google Alerts and put some keywords in there to help monitor when something comes online about you. You may just be surprised at what you find, hopefully in a good way.
Keep in mind that is simply not enough. You need to get engaged in the conversation, help people out and make sure you’re not getting pummeled out there.
Do you have any experiences where you found your brand online being talked about? Was it positive or negative? What did you do to help the situation?