Category Archives: Social Media

Conversation About vs Conversation With

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an old design 02

I wrote recently that

Consider the worn-out ‘Social Media is a conversation‘ mantra. Yes, conversation is a part of Social Media, but not everyone wants to talk non-stop with you! Consistent conversation is a rare thing when compared to how much conversation is going on. Thinking that everyone will now post on your businesses’ Facebook Page is flawed thinking. They won’t, because there is no reason to. It’s overestimation of participation.

When working with clients I clarify this as separating Conversation About from Conversation With. I’ve been talking about ‘making things personal’ but in doing so I think I’ve overestimated myself the subtle difference between these two very different kinds of conversation. Continue reading →

Are You A Builder Or A Bulldozer?

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It’s easy to tear things down. I learnt as a young boy that there’s little effort and lots of joy to wrecking things. But building something takes time and hard work.

It is easy to criticise and get the attention for being vocal. It’s hard to build behind the scenes, or deal with situations offline, rather than publicly point the finger. Continue reading →

Flatness, Equality, Social Media and Communism

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httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ashKB16gyvc

Last Friday we had some great discussion on the idea of a “Flat Social Media Earth“. In the above video, I’m just bringing a few more thoughts to the table, but first, I just want to recap what was said in the comments:

Jeroen Hoekman said, quite radically, that,

“it is impossible for social media to be flat. Unequality is intrinsic to Social media. People have so many “friends” or “followers”, because they want to feel popular, feel like a celebrity. Make people equal and you might kill social media.” Continue reading →

Three Ways To Write Blog Posts

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lungs

Being a preacher and a pastor, you get taught a valuable lesson when it comes to growing church by keeping your visitors and inspiring them to come back week after week. I think it applies to blogging too.

You can write blog posts one of three ways:

1. Preach them full.

Give everything you’ve got, and then give them more than the need. 10 reasons for this, 39 tips for that, 15 ways to do naught. Stuff them full of content. Sure they are full and you have satisfied the need, but in doing so you have eliminated what drove them to you in the first place: hunger. Continue reading →

Do You Believe In A Flat Social Media Earth?

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One of the mantras of Social Media advocates (of which I’m one) is the flatenning effect. It’s what I noticed a year ago (and wrote about here) when I was able to speak directly to directors, CEOs, managers and decision makers without getting asked “And who are you?” by a secretary before being refused to be transfered to the boss’ direct line.

I guess what it means is that you don’t need a business card – Social Media gives you a direct line.

And in this way, yes, I feel that the world is the flattest that it has been since Copernicus came on the scene. But still, things – and people – are not all equal. Continue reading →

Building Community Part 1

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What follows is what I have observed about building community over the last 10 years. There are 10 steps, each of which builds on the other, but can always be revisited. Today is part 1 and the first 3 steps.

1. Prepare

Before any discussion of community there must be personal preparation. Because community is relationship around more than it is relationship with, you must prepare yourself to be an effective catalyst. Community requires activation. A leader activates community and makes it happen – they unite people and ideas with other people and other ideas that previously had not come together.

What do you prepare? Your voice, your vision, your values. Continue reading →

People-To-People: A Few Thoughts

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Me and @farhan, 9 months in the making!

The above photo was a long time coming. That was last Friday when finally, after 9 months since we first attempted to meet, Farhan and I finally shook hands. It’s an interesting thing, this photo, and it ties together a few thoughts I’ve been having over the recent weeks on People-to-People which I’d like to share. Continue reading →

Social Media Planning, In 4 Phases

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Part of my commitment on this blog (and a commitment I require every Like Minds speak to fulfil) is providing IDEA: inspiration, decision-making information, examples, and calls to action.

Today I’m just dishing out some decision making information to assist you in drawing up Social Media programs.

What follows are 4 phases from 50,000 to the ground. Note: this is just what goes into planning. This isn’t even touching execution – it’s just the fore-thought that we go through when we work with our clients and on Like Minds.

Phase 1: 50,000 – 40,000 feet

Vision, Mission, Objectives. Above the line stuff. This should click into an organisation’s existing vision and then extend into mission and objectives for your Social Media program.

Goals. What are the metrics that your stake holders (whoever they maybe) want to see? Conversions, clicks, signups, sentiment change, intent change. Continue reading →

The Pitfall of the Overestimation of Participation

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httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPYvZZe5-bo

For a long time when it came to consulting in digital marketing, I’d be asked what the best thing to do was to achieve a loose objective, and I’d in turn provide the usual no-brainer advice of giving the voice to the people, providing value, suggesting a permission asset, getting retweets, blah blah blah.

I can’t begin to tell you how many times I’ve failed by having little focus, and and as a result, committed the cardinal mistake of overestimation of participation. The result? Ghost towns. Disappointed. Unhappy investors. This post addresses the latter.

Continue reading →

Friendship 2.0 and Beyond

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httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0h0LlCu8Ks

There’s a great discussion going on right now at my friend Robin Dickinson‘s blog on “Building Relationships: A Question of Quality Over Quantity” (go and read it!)

Today I’m hoping we can pick up on a key topic that has risen from the comments on Robin’s post, mainly about what I guess is easiest to describe as Friendship 2.0. We’ll look at what’s wrong with the current idea of friends, how we misplace confidence in community, and how we can move forward with genuine connections that get things done. Continue reading →