You began with a glorious hallucination of what social media was going to do for your business, social life, and even writing ability. You tweeted, facebooked, and smothered Linked-in contacts with glowing recommendations. You commented on all the top blogs in your niche and dutifully updated your own blog on-schedule. You may have even dropped a few hundred dollars to listen to others tell you how to tweet, facebook, and smother.
Then you woke up. You may have read about a freelance writer moving to a tropical island, seen Dell Outlet’s sales report, or heard a podcast from some kids paying for college by selling iPhone apps. No matter the trigger, it suddenly hits you that you seem to be the only one not making big money from this social media “thing.” All the happy conversations, serendipitous connections, and lessons learned seem tarnished and heavy in your hand. You’re exhausted and have so little to show for all your labor!
Welcome to the land of the living, friend! What you’re going through is common for most individuals who pursue a long-term goal without the guidance and feedback of short-term benchmarks. You haven’t done anything wrong. What’s more likely is that you’ve put a lot of energy into doing all the right things without knowing what to expect in return. Your dream of a burgeoning bottom line, pina coladas, and a diverse group of friends is still possible. You simply need to embrace a process. To borrow the words of Rene Descartes,
Divide each difficulty into as many parts as is feasible and necessary to resolve it.
That doesn’t sound especially fun, does it? Probably not. But you already had your fun at the beginning when you ran around, happily without direction, soaking up all there was to know about social media. And now? Now you need to put that knowledge to work with a process that will help you reach your goals. Here are three steps and five reminders to help you forward:
The Process:
I’ll be breaking down each step into further detail with preferred methods and tools in future articles. [subscribe so you don't miss out]
1. Dream
Dreaming is the fun part. This is where you get to go crazy with brainstorming, mind-mapping, and generally embrace the irrational. If you’re lucky, you’ll come away with a general direction and perhaps some specific points you’d like to reach.
2. Dissect
Dissection is rarely fun. You have to take all the fuzzy bunnies from the dream stage and chop them into bite-size chunks. If you’re not comfortable with using spreadsheets and calendars because some conference guru told you that, “social media is about people, not MBA mumbo-jumbo” please click [here] to re-enter your dream. If, however, you are ready to begin making tangible progress toward your social media goals, dissection won’t be especially frightening for you. Start with a big goal, divide it into smaller sub-goals, and outline how you’ll reach those sub-goals through weekly achievements. Take a deep breath. It’s cool. You’re going to be fine.
3. Demonstrate
Demonstration is not as much fun as dreaming but has the lovable perk of being the phase where you get to see real progress taking place each week. You have your goals, sub-goals, and steps. Now you need to actually go through those steps consistently. One thing I’ve found very helpful in my own process is the idea of a 20-minute daily base. It’s a short list of daily tasks that I must do if I want to reach my goals on-time. Even if I’ve let my schedule get away from me and I don’t have time to complete my full list of tasks, I always have time to get my daily base out of the way.
As you work to develop your own process for a successful social media experience, remember:
- Money is seldom found in surprising places – If you consistently found money between the cushions on your couch, you’d quit your job and rely on your money couch, right? In a similar vein, the web isn’t loaded with wealthy eccentrics hoping to pay you for the fun of it. Put aside the stories of millions in minutes and focus on what you can do to make your own business model more successful.
- Your memory isn’t good enough – Don’t trust yourself to remember birthdays, favorite blogs, special talents, and unfinished conversations. My father often quotes the phrase, “The dullest pencil is sharper than the sharpest mind.” Digital media is even sharper because it’s searchable.
- Minimize “travel” time - If you walk 100 miles in planting a bag of seeds you’ll need to walk that same 100 miles every time you want to water, cultivate, and finally harvest your reward. Make sense?
- Predictable quality is often better than predictable presence – Just showing up was enough to be a success 5 years ago when most of the developed world didn’t know or care about blogs. Times have changed. Maki (doshdosh) can take 6 months off from blogging and come back without missing a beat. What would happen if Mashable tried the same stunt? The site would fail. Why? Because, while Maki is known for producing legacy content, Mashable continues to come under fire for finding its only relevance through timely remarks. For the individual and small business, Maki’s example is probably the best one to follow.
- We all have to ration our time – You don’t have the time or stamina to be constantly online and interacting with strangers and customers alike. Recognize, prioritize, and move away from the activities you simply don’t have time for. Putting your time toward activities with real payouts might offend a few near-strangers in the short run but they’ll be back to buy your book once you’ve found success.
N.B. Regarding cookie dough: While many shy away from the pleasures of cookie dough for fear of contracting e. coli, salmonella, or some other end-hastener, you need worry no longer. The bearer of all danger, the common chicken egg, isn’t actually necessary for a decent cookie. Next time you make a batch, use a tablespoon of ground flax seeds and three tablespoons of water in place of each egg. The flax adds a mild nutty flavor, holds the dough as well as any egg, and gives you freedom to save every morsel of dough from the horrors of oven cookery.