One of the complaints I hear time and time again from people who want to start getting involved in social media is that they are so overwhelmed by it all, they simply don’t know what to do. Most people are aware that there are literally thousands of social media sites available. Many of them receive invites to new ones daily from friends and before long, they have joined up countless sites which they will probably never go to more than once or twice. But how do you know which ones it is worth being a part of? And how do you know whether you are missing out on something good?
The reality is, you simply can’t be in every place all the time. However, the good news is that you don’t need to – in fact, spreading yourself too thinly is one of the quickest ways to burn out, or the best way to ensure you don’t make an impact anywhere. Although you are putting on a global face when you log on to the internet, there are really only a finite number of people that you really want to talk to, influence or connect with.
The first thing, therefore, is to determine who those people are. You don’t have to list them by name (although having names can be useful), all you really need to do is identify the demographic you are concerned with. If your demographic is ‘everyone’, then that’s OK as well. Because ‘everyone’ generally averages out to the person in the street, and the person in the street is more than likely only going to know of a select few social media sites, and is only going to engage of a small percentage of that select few.
My advice to people is to choose one or two at most and really commit to them. In reality, most of the new sites which spring up are tested by the early adopters (who are only a very small group in the whole scheme of things) and then either maintained or abandoned by that group. A site can take a long time before your average person in the street even hears of it, and even longer before that person decides to use it. Therefore, your one or two sites should be the sites which your target audience is spending a good amount of time on, which may mean that you stick with those sites that are now mainstream (or close to mainstream). Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube – as overused as all these names are, they are overused for a reason – because most people know about them.
I always recommend blogging as a cornerstone, and I generally suggest Twitter, but of the other two, it is up to you to take your pick. The simple fact is, you can’t eat an elephant in one bite – you need to break it into small, manageable pieces. You are far more likely to develop a reputation and build a strong network by devoting your time to a very few places than if you attempt to do it all. In this way, social media becomes less overwhelming and starts to become enjoyable.
Thank you to Ben Harris-Roxas for the image
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