The New Media is Liberating the (Business) World...more than you may know!

By Chuck Sink

Beyond basic survival, the greatest need of all human beings is to be loved and appreciated. We all crave the recognition and praise of our peers and loved ones. This trait of humanity is what Dale Carnegie leveraged into a vaunted worldwide training organization.

Social Media is a fascinating anthropological study. If you have a large and active Facebook-Twitter-Linked in network, you may have become familiar with some people's personalities without ever having met them. You begin to notice trends and patterns in what topics tend to resonate toward further discussions. You can immediately see how people need to express themselves, be noticed and even try to out-do one another.

Like the schoolyard playground, the social playground of online networking would be a great environment to conduct a study on human nature and societal dynamics. I would assume that's being done somewhere. The point I'm about to make is one that I believe should be a wake up call to business owners and their advertising/marketing people. The Social Media marketplace is at the very least "required reading" and, more realistically, the most important potential audience your brand has ever had!

If someone posts a shiny object and a lot of people comment, someone else is bound to post an even shiner one and many in the discussion thread may say "wow!" and re-post, re-tweet or forward it to others! The viral marketing power of this phenomenon is tremendous! It gives ordinary people extraordinary abilities to reach a wide and willing audience with their ideas. Nothing really new here except the stunning numbers now actively participating in Social Media - hundreds and hundreds of millions! Facebook alone has already surpassed 350 million users and the growth pace hasn't waned.

Those who are nodding their heads, you know what I'm talking about! Those who still think social media is a fad or are chagrined by it's sudden emergence, have I got your attention?

There still exist out-dated corporate policies that block social media use by employees. What a missed opportunity!

Examples mount up daily of new business opportunities found and deals closed online before any competition had a chance to make a pitch.

Only One Man's Experience:

* Just last week I spotted a Facebook wall post seeking recommendations for good Web 2.0 developers. I responded immediately and made an appointment to discuss a substantial piece of business. The project is an excellent fit for us and it would be completely invisible to me were it not for Facebook! I would never have known this deal existed.

* I noticed a new job announcement from a former colleague and didn't know the company until I saw other people ask where she landed. Her answer was a firm I've previously called on. Turns out she's replacing the retiring marketing director. We connected on Facebook and will likely meet soon over possible allocations of a marketing budget.

* I now have unsolicited business prospects following me on Twitter. (That tells me to post things valuable to them!)

Social media has been a direct factor in other business I've gained. These are just my own concrete results in a B2B environment. The consumer driven conversations about brands and products go on like wildfire out there.

Retail and consumer product organizations need to be in the middle of this. Their managers and salespeople should be flanking units in the marketing battles for consumers' attention. It would be wise for any company to use their employees to fortify their social media strategies.

The true power of social media to liberate individuals, the self-employed and small businesses is awesome. As little as 5 years ago a business needed to raise capital prior to launching an effective marketing campaign. Now one needs only a vision, a computer, internet connection and some time.

This is not the article to go into the myriad free applications available on Linked in, Twitter, Facebook and numerous blogging sites but their business networking and publishing capabilities may impress you as you dig into them.

Returning to my first premise about what what motivates people - recognition and praise - today's marketers and salespeople need to think carefully about how to position their offerings in the new media. Ask yourself these questions:

* How can my product or service be seen as remarkable enough to talk about?
* How might it help my social media contacts be recognized for their resourcefulness?
* Why would someone want to forward (re-tweet) my information to friends and colleagues?
* Need we make improvements to our product/service to win the attention and praise of our social media audience?
* Are we willing to be thick-skinned and open-hearted concerning criticism and diversity of opinions?

In closing, I'd like to thank you for your interest in this article. I would also like to congratulate you for your inquisitive mind and excellent judgment in choosing what blogs to read ;-)


We will be featuring more examples, case studies and how-to information about the new media in forthcoming issues of Big Hit Bits. We would be happy to answer questions or provide a path to resources that may help your business. Contact me at chuck@bighitmedia.com. Visit www.bighitmedia.com or call 603-345-7223.