Market Yourself Smarter

Posted by: Laurinda Shaver

With the social media meltdown yesterday, I was lost.

It started with my Tweetie account being completely empty. No text. I asked around the videoBIO office if anyone was having Twitter issues. Check.
Then I went to Facebook. And (being a mac gal) I watched the loading circle button go around and around. "Facebook down too?" Check.

I was ok. I could deal with not being plugged into the world for a little bit. My need for personal expression could be tempered with other work at hand.
By mid day, I think I had the withdrawal shakes. What was happening to me?

I was missing that strong human need: feeling connected. We sometimes focus so much on the social networks themselves, we forget what the point is. Their purpose is to help build and maintain relationships with like-minded people. Belong to a tribe, a community. The big deal is not the social communities themselves, but the service that they provide. Like Josh Mernoff and Charlene Li said in their book "Groundswell", concentrate on the relationships, not the technology.

Are you using the technology to serve your need to build relationships? Do you have specific networking goals and are you working towards them? Or are you just playing with the technology (when its working)?

For example, sign up for LinkedIn and actively use the platform to increase your connections. It says alot when someone searches for you and your connections are 0 - 5. You would be better off not signing up at all if you are not committed to using the tool. You will be not be taken seriously.

Instead of you going to the info, have relevant and timely information come to you. Sign up for the Market Yourself Smarter's e-newsletter for online marketing tips. There is nothing to maintain and you are using a great tool to increase your knowledge.

Anyway, the outage is still ongoing so I picked up the phone. "Did you know twitter is down?... oh.. its back up?? Gotta go! Talk soon. Bye."