Whats the big deal about Social Media?

I met a lady this weekend that was reading “Facebook for Dummies” and was curious as to way someone would read up about Facebook instead of playing around with it; not to mention that when she has finished with it the material would be outdated. She mentioned that she was in charge of their Social Media marketing for a new church plant and needed to familiarize herself with Social Media. This lead to me think about the implications of Social Media for small organizations and startups.

“Social Media Experts” will tell everyone and their mothers that they need to have a blog, that connects with their rss feed to tweet out their post which is also connected to their Facebook account so that their Facebook fans will be notified. Not to mention that they should setup TweetDeck and monitor keywords so you’ll be able to participate in the Twittersphere and keep an eye on their brand. Big Whoop! Are you really generating new customers through this? Could your time and energy be used on other areas of your new business? I am not knocking on Social Media Experts but feel that the term is used too loosely and people better be able to show the goods if they call themselves an “Expert”.

During the last year while I was running a real estate business I thought that this whole Social Media thing would bring business beyond belief. Setup a blog, Tweet them out, engage in the social conversation, be relevant, meet the customer where they are, and let the good times roll. I started out with getting a Twitter account and following other real estate agents but shortly realized that other real estate agents are only following me in hopes that I’ll follow them back and read their tweets and be directed to their websites. Thats not going to work; in essence you are creating a following that is self-serving, “I’ll follow you, in hopes that you’ll follow me, so I can tell you about stuff that I’m trying to sell to you.” Well I don’t really want real estate agents because they are not my customers, let me setup keywords and find people in the Seattle area that tweet about “buying a home” “selling a home” “looking for an agent”. This too didn’t work as normal people don’t tweet in context about such things. Added to my dismal social media efforts, every blog post that I wrote and tweeted to my hundreds of real estate “friends” would receive no attention. 

I believe that my experience as an unknown brand just starting out isn’t uncommon for many new businesses and organizations. They hear success stories and want to get on the Social Media bandwagon. So whats the big deal about Social Media and how do you make it work? I believe Social Media is great for personal use and should be treated the same way for businesses. People don’t want to be sold stuff, they want to see the personality behind the business, they want to know who you are and what you are doing. Start out with creating a blog, follow your loyal customers, ask them to follow you back, and engage your users about your business. The ultimate key and where your time and efforts should be is creating loyal customers; customers that are raving fans and walking billboards that can’t say enough good things about you. They’ll make you relevant in the Twittersphere.