KimberMedia

Anti-Social Social Media Marketing

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in Facebook, Google+, Social Media, Social Networks, Twitter, YouTube
July 5, 2012

Saying social media are extremely efficient for connecting with people near or far is like saying circles are round. Once you’ve tweeted or posted, or watched a video gone viral, you experience for yourself the power of these channels.

They work. I think we all get it.

But I was reading one of those “Give Me 5 Social Media Tips” posts on a blog not long ago that really surprised me. The author offered in his top 5 insights that he uses social media to make important introductions that he almost always follows with an in-person meeting.

He never loses focus on closing a deal.

Unless your business is strictly an internet-based e-commerce business, you’ll get the wisdom of this advice, even though I’ve never seen a social media guru suggest it until now. I admit it, I don’t need to make a personal connection with Jeff Bezos to order hundreds of dollars worth of merchandise from Amazon.com.

But most of the big money transactions I’ve been involved in could never happen without some sort of personal connection or contact.

The more I watch Facebook become a utility (like water, electric service, sewer), the more I see people who are misled by the perception that their Facebook friends are really true friends. Friendship involves closeness, familiarity and trust.

I need trust to spend large amounts of money. Even though I’m happy to buy a bar of soap without getting to know the cashier, I’m not comfortable, so far, buying a house off of a web site.

Nothing illustrates this better right now than the hilarious Toyota Venza commercial that’s in pretty high rotation.

The star of the commerical is a young woman who’s concerned that her parents have only 19 Friends in their social media circles, while she has 687. “This is living,” she says while sitting alone with her laptop at the dining room table, comfortably surrounded by her hipster props, keeping tabs on her social media channels. You know, looking at pictures of puppies.

 

 

Her parents, meanwhile, are out bicycling with their real friends.

It’s so convenient to sit at your desk and watch your Likes go up over time as you tend to your social media strategy. But are customers doing business with you?

Don’t let the perception of connection keep you from stepping out from the virtual world to do what’s necessary to seal a deal.

Kevin is a blogger and account manager with KimberMedia. And he’s a no slouch with WordPress. So he’s in on our website maintenance projects, too. Kevin has a long history as a project manager. He schemes, then gets things done. He’s a small business owner, an association executive, a registered lobbyist, a yoga teacher, a biologist and a word nerd. He likes to sing in the choir at church, travel, and laugh a lot. Google