I thought I would share with fellow ecademists some thoughts I’ve been having of late, prompted by my social media training sessions.
It seems that many of us have more than one business stream, and, when it comes to on-line branding and visibility, many people ask me whether they should have one on-line identity or individual ones for each business. It’s an interesting question and no one really knows the definitive answer, but I have reached a conclusion.
If we consider Penny’s theory of "Know Me. Like Me. Follow Me", it would seem that we lead people on this journey through our on-line activities and participation.
Know me is the first stage where we self-publish and broadcast our opinion, thoughts, and knowledge to develop credibility in our niche area of expertise. It is where we start banking "contribution currency", adding value to others, helping people, developing reciprocity, and being supportive.
Like me is where social conversations take place on-line, where we start the process of turning a stranger into a friend, and where we start to build deeper relationships.
Follow me is the final stage where we have built enough trust to turn a friend into a customer or an advocate, and there are increased business transactions as a result. (There are on-line and off-line elements of this, and ecademy is one of the greatest tools in your tool box for this part of the process).
So, on the above basis, what we are simply doing is giving people the opportunity to get to know us, like us, and most importantly TRUST us. Business can only generally occur where there is trust so this is why it is so important to recognise that social media is the future of marketing, (but not in the way most of us understand it). If the whole world is going on-line, where do you need to be, and what do you need to do to stand out from all the "noise"?
The answer is to simply be YOU. Everyone else is taken anyway.
So if you have several businesses, I am going to put forward the theory that you should focus on one core business, the one that you feel most passionate about. Build your on-line brand, personality, and profile around that one business. Once people LIKE and TRUST you, you can then expose them to your other business activities, even if they are totally un-related.
Vanessa and I are doing this very successfully. Many of our property people have migrated across to our social media training, and no doubt some of our social media clients will be interested to know more about our property activities, particularly when the market starts to recover!
So, by being liked and trusted on-line you are actually HEDGING YOUR BUSINESS RISK. … Because, should you ever need to change your business for un-forseen reasons in the future, your "following" have bought into YOU, not your business, so you can take them with you to your next venture.
Penny always says that engaging in social media is the only way to future-proof your business. I would take that to another level, and say that social media is the only way to future-proof YOURSELF!
Care to discuss? – click here -
P.s. Tangent: if you are a corporate wage slave, might it now be a good idea to start taking care of No. 1 and build your own brand and profile on the web?
N
