Social Media: Not Enough Time!

Clients always ask me what I recommend doing about social media since there is a perception out there that every company should be doing “all these social media channels”.  At the risk of getting yelled at by all of the social media experts, I am going to tell my clients that I encourage them to think long and hard about a strong and solid social media strategy.  One of the best specialists in this area that I know in person, +Juli Monroe with 1 to 1 Discovery, has finally put me out of my social media guilt trip by helping me to see that not every social channel is appropriate to every business type; so selecting the channel that is relevant is key.

Then there is the issue of time. Simply put, I am not so unlike most small business people. I have work to do and clients to help so even if the conclusion for me was that I need to do most of the channels I just don’t have time, period.

So I now pass on to my clients the bottom line of what Juli taught me: pick your channel wisely, commit to it, and get it done in a strategic fashion.  If you don’t have the time, if you don’t care, and if you are simply not going to do it, either DO NOT DO IT or PAY someone to do it for you.

Please don’t put icons on your web site for every channel and then when one clicks all there is a ten month old post, a tweet with three followers that says “hi there”, and a Facebook page that has a nice landscape image (if that has nothing to do with your business).

As for me, if you look at our web site, you will only find the icon to Google+ because I like what I see in this channel and I find it relevant.  And as a proud baby boomer I will tell you that I still love most is doing my social media IN PERSON-that is networking where I can shake a hand, look at a person’s eyes, and let people like me or not, because this is who I am and I don’t happen to need 100 “likes” on what I have to say to feel comfortable in my skin.  I am not suggesting that others do or don’t place that type of value on their social media efforts, and surely I am not past doing my share of “likes” when I see cool stuff but on a day to day basis I just don’t have time.

By +Animus Web Design