Underground Blog

The excuse of “I don’t have time for social media” doesn’t work. I hear it many times. But then I also hear experts say that the execution of social media tactics can only come from within that company. Well, I don’t agree with that either because frankly, it’s not always practical.

As brand development consultants, we can keep banging our heads against the wall and preaching “set aside 1 hour or more per day” for social media, watch clients roll their eyes and see this vital tool be forgotten about. Or we can be consultative partners in building that presence for them to point of handling every last blogpost and tweet for them.

If we’re going to keep preaching the benefits of social media – and I have witnessed those benefits firsthand – then I believe we have to help people do it to the point of where we do it for them.

What I am getting at is that there is an alternative if you don’t have the time for social media. Hire someone who does. This isn’t easy. You can’t just dial up a freelance writer and say “Hey, you write pretty well, can you blog for me?” Uh-uh. Remember, you are choosing someone who has to be intimately involved with what your company is about, your brand, your processes, your people, your goals and your customers. They have to sound like they work there and have worked there for years, even if they don’t and haven’t.

Let’s be absolutely clear – nobody can sound more authentic than you and if you or someone in your company can generate the voice of your social media presence, it’s a very good thing. But if not, the person you hire to step into that role has to come as close to your voice as possible.

Some people disagree with me on this, which is fine. They say it’s not authentic to write in the voice of a person or company if you aren’t actually that person or work for that company. What I argue is that as long as that person or company provides a rubber stamp of approval in a very timely fashion to blogs, tweets, articles, etc., social media representation can work. They are approving of the communication that goes out into the world that they don’t have time themselves to generate.

So as you evaluate someone to be an extension of you, keep these 5 thoughts in mind:

1) Be in agreement on the channels.
Don’t leave it up to the person or company representing you to choose the mix for you. Get on the same page. Make them explain why this makes sense for your audience and marketing strategy, not just because everybody else is on LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.

2) Quick approval is key.
Social media execution has to be timely and consistent, therefore the approval process has to be as well. If I have to wait 4 weeks for you and/or a chain of command to approve things, it’s not going to work.

3) Have one person internally be the quick approver.
Social media approval by committee is such a bad idea that if you’re going to water down content and make the approval process bottleneck that much, you should just not do social media at all. Have one person be the designated approver of content, make sure they understand the responsibility of the role and keep the momentum going. And make sure that internal approver has a very accessible back-up.

4) Don’t micromanage every last word.
If you’re going to do that, just generate social media content yourself. Why did you bother hiring someone and wasting everyone’s time? Of course you should have a say in the content. But you’re actually making it worse to put everything that goes out into the world through an extreme filter. If you can’t get with the idea that the person or company you’ve hired has to sound like a human being in some form, you shouldn’t hire someone to represent you in the social media universe. Be hands-on and be timely with approving but don’t be so hands-on with editing the other person’s content that you do yourself more harm than good. There has to be some degree of trust going on here. Allow a certain flexibility in the tone and message that must come with one human being trying to talk to others. And then, do what I’m talking about in point #5.

5) Communicate regularly with the person or company generating content to talk about future direction, results, goals and more.
Remember, this content is still representing you and you very much require a say in the overall direction, including whether or not a shift in channels and message is necessary.

For most companies I’ve seen, social media makes sense as part of an overall strategy. In all likelihood, yours is probably one of those companies. But the idea that social media content generation is a “done by the company or done by nobody” proposition is one I challenge and have proven wrong.

“Ghost writing” has been done for many years before the appearance of social media, so the concept of writers and artists handling communication on behalf of clients is nothing new.

So don’t worry about not having time for social media. It would be ideal if you did. However, if you don’t have time for it but want to find yourself involved in it, as I’ve outlined above, there’s another way in. And if you don’t take advantage of that road, well, then you really have only yourself to blame.

There are plenty of people out there that grab hold of every paper, every article, on every subject and study them like they’re getting ready for the Inquisition. But as the great Monty Python pointed out, nobody expects the Inquisition. What I’m really getting at is, that if you take too long preparing, you might miss your opportunity.

The next big thing was yesterday.
If you’re hearing about it on the news, from your friends, or from your kids, you’re probably late to the party. Take Social Media for example. It’s the darling of the water cooler right now. There are thousands of articles that pretty much say the same thing – Social Media is great, get on. Some explain the right way. Others tell you how to avoid the wrong way. And some actually say nothing. But if you read every one that’s out there before you put together your Social Media Strategy, we’ll be onto Hologramming before you can even send your first Tweet.  Don’t get me wrong, research is an essential part of launching any kind of marketing. But it’s not more important than, um, the marketing part of the marketing.  So don’t overanalyze – learn it, then use it.

Use good advice. Not all advice.
Be very cautious when dealing with preachers and teachers who make a business out of selling the medium of the day.  If someone is only a social media expert, stay away. Just like if someone is only a Google expert, stay away. Their recommendations and their research will be biased towards their “thing.” Sure, we all try to sell our services, but many of us build our service around our client’s needs. Not the other way around. If a guy is an expert in a medium that’s changing all the time, he’s essentially a liar.

Move your feet. The rest will follow.
I went to my first dance when I was 10. I was a nervous wreck. My friends all were asking the girls to dance, but I was embarrassed – I had never danced before. What I didn’t know was neither had anybody else. I finally got the courage up and asked a cute little girl from my class, Kristen, to dance with me. We danced three dances in a row, and we got better each time. Do you see what I’m saying? Don’t give in to analysis paralysis when it comes to marketing or trying new ideas. The longer you wait, the harder it becomes.  If I stood back and tried to learn how to dance just by watching, that smelly kid Richard may have stolen my dance partner. Instead, I got to groove while he stood back and ate all the cheese and crackers.  So take that first step and follow the rhythm, and you’ll find that practice always trumps theory.