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Scary Social Media 1

Social Media – it’s a scary ever-changing world I wish was never invented say many

Social Media – it’s scarier not to be involved than to be involved in the conversation is often our reply

It’s simply a change and shift in the way people communicate and you have to move with the times or risk being left behind

Often we meet businesses and they have oft-repeated excuses and lines about social media that they wear as a badge of honour

So in our latest blog we look at the Scary Things You Still Hear People Say About Social Media and fix a few of those excuses

1. “It’s a passing fad”

A fad is defined as “an intense and widely shared enthusiasm for something, especially one that is short-lived”

Social media is not new any more

If you look back to Myspace and even forums before that the penetration of social media into everyday life has been unstoppable.

Myspace was founded in 2003 and from the years 2005-2008 it was the world’s biggest social network

You all have kids that are younger than social media and yet we’re sat here questioning whether something that has been part of our everyday life for at least 12 years is a fad

If you believe Social Media is a fad, it’s because you weren’t paying attention for all the years that millions of people were using it

2. “It Only Works For B2C”

At the heart of Social Media is communication and relationships

So in that respect if social media only works for B2C then face 2 face networking should only work for B2C

What people often mean they say “it only works for B2C” is that the decision making process is a lot quicker on a low ticket item such as clothes or a restaurant, than they are on changing an accountancy or insurance company

The process to making a B2B purchase via social media will take the same amount of time attending face 2 face networking meetings

But as we wrote in our “Social Media – What To Do Before, During and After A Networking Event” blog – when you do face 2 face and social media together they’re so much more powerful

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3. “I have a personal account to check news / football, but I haven’t got a business account”

If you’re using social media in a personal capacity, you understand it’s important for the spread of information and ideas

You understand that is the way people consume information nowadays

It’s not much of a leap to therefore understand how it can work from a business perspective

For instance you’ve read this blog quicker than you could have consumed it by attending a 2 hour networking meeting

If you can offer value and education via social media for business then you’re half way there to winning with social media

4. “I haven’t got time to do Social Media”

If you’re quiet – you have the time to do social media

If you’re busy – you have the budget for outsourcing social media

There is no excuse for not doing social media

The only question therefore is how we’ll you’re doing it

5. “I’m not really on social media, I’m doing more face to face marketing”

Networking and Social Media are perfect partners

Doing both individually will help grow your business, but by combining the power of both you’ll be unstoppable

There’s a lot of similarities between a great networker and a great social networker

In our recent blog we looked at what to do before, during and after a networking on Social Media to make the most out of any networking event

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6. “We used to be on social media and then XXX left and we don’t have the logins”

A lot of businesses spend thousands on IT systems to protect themselves from viruses, spyware and malware attacks

They pay for 24 hour security to protect their physical premises

And then allow anyone in the business to set the social media profiles for the business to market their business to 10’s of thousands of people without any thought to password security or what happens when the person leaves

We’ve seen stories such as HMV interns live tweeting redundancies from social media accounts which the managers have no access to

At all times the managers / owners of the business should have access to and passwords for the social media profiles to avoid critical mistakes

7. “The boss doesn’t even use email, we won’t be able to convince him to use social media”

You may be able to exist for a period without using social media, but the clue is in the word period. You will soon be replaced by someone who draws more attention

Every single second you question if social media is the answer – there’s someone out there using that second to generate revenue and extra sales via social media

I imagine staff have this discussion every day in business

“Yeah i’d love for our business to be relevant and modern – but there’s some old guy managing the company who thinks social media is a passing fad and is set to retire in a few years so doesn’t want change”

They’re probably too afraid to speak up

They’re scared that you will expect instant results from social media and not have the patience for the long term wins from Social Media

They’re scared that when social media doesn’t work in one week or one month it will be their neck on the line

Don’t be the person that blocks your companies Social Media Success with cynicism

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8. “We have an account, but we just automate our blog posts to go out”

Automation is there to make your life easier

It’s not there to be a complete replacement system for conversations

And conversations are the secret to success with social media

You need to listen to and talk with people to build relationships, to understand and to serve them better

You can’t do that if the total output of your social media is a WordPress plugin to automate your blog updates

9. “I’ve got an account, but I don’t really know what I’m doing with it”

Training is the answer to anything you can’t to properly

It’s why we spend the bulk of our formative years in education to learn life’s essentials

It’s why parents mortgage their life away to get their children in the best schools

Why then as business owners do we try and DIY our marketing, undoubtedly one of the most important aspects of our business.

If you know something if important – get training so you can do it properly

NEED HELP WITH YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA?
Chat to about Social Media Marketing for YOUR organisation , so we can better understand YOU and what will grow your organisation

We can only find out what is unique to your business by chatting with you

Look at our Social Media Training and Social Media Management services

Or

Please call Alex on 07806774279 or email alex@altrinchamhq.co.uk

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Alex McCann

Author Alex McCann

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