It’s been almost 2 months since my last blog post and I know you “should” be doing this once a week. But something hit me before the Holiday break. I was up at 4 in the morning and the first thing I checked (instead of taking a Tylenol PM and going back to bed) was my Facebook and Twitter accounts. See below:
So upon this, I made it my point to really try to get back to the roots of my obsession with Twitter followers and trite Facebook status updates. Albeit, the majority of the tweets and Facebook status updates are benign ramblings about meaningless items in our lives or a selfish “personal branding” promotion, I found it increasingly difficult to really connect with people. So what did I do? I completely dropped off the grid. For about a month. Sorry Alltop. I know you guys dropped me from your thread.
Oh well.
What I discovered was something that I had been missing for a while; concrete, meaningful relationships. I didn’t listen well because I was too busy talking about me and my goals. My quest for recognition in this crowded digital space had overshadowed why I was really here in the first place: to create connections.
So in January, I began to creep back into Facebook and Twitter and I discovered that I needed something much more. I needed my Tweets and Status Updates to count for something. So I started a project. More on that later.
So from a branding perspective, here’s what I took away:
1- You’re not as important as you think you are.
Brand managers. If you think for a second that people want to buy and promote your product or service because the tactics you use are so good? Think again. People talk about your service, product or you because they connect. Until you find a way to connect with people where they are, forget about digital strategy, social media, marketing and all the other crap we guys talk about all day long. It doesn’t mean anything if you can’t connect. It will turn them into a number. And people hate to be objectified.
2- Your Strategy Map looks more like a winding pathway than a straight road.
More often than not, brand managers and social media “experts” think if they do A + B, eventually it will equal C. Actually think of your formula more like an algorithm that changes as it’s slope increases on the X and Y axis. In other words, a vertical line, whether vertical or horizontal, is anything divided by zero- and that’s an undefined number. Try navigating the path that your customers/advocates take you on and listen to them. They’ll never lead you straight. It’s about slope. Eventually you’ll get your answer. It just takes time.
true brand strategy
3- Listening is more about listening for context than reacting to a conversation.
If the last point wasn’t defeatist enough, then you’ll love this one. In his book Trust Agents, Chris Brogan shows how to set up a listening station. Something that I have done on many occasions but seldom use. I know that’s a “NO NO” for guys like me. (I’m getting way better at it though) Pete Cashmore wrote on a CNN column, that “people have way more information than they could possibly consume”. So that being said, when we set up our “listening posts”, what are we listening for? Our name? How many times we have been mentioned? A customer complaint? A question about a product or service? So what? Discovering the context of conversation should be our goal. It’s one thing to listen, but it’s another thing to engage. If you’re married you KNOW what I’m talking about.
So while I was off, I concentrated on more engaging and really understanding the context of the conversations I was in. I asked more questions to construct dialogue and never asked for anything. What did that get me? A lot actually. New friends. Great contacts and a new found appreciation for what we have going on in Dallas. So for a little bit, focus on quality and leave the numbers and the Quest for ROI alone. Engage your people. Understand context of the conversation being stimulated when you listen.
Lesson: My wife will sometimes ask me in conversation if I’m listening to her. And I am, but sometimes passively. We as marketers have a tendency to appear like we’re listening but never really engaging in conversation. And that could lead to a real big problem in the future. Just ask Toyota. So engage and understand context. Yes it takes a while, but the qualitative “fruit” will last much longer. Become an active listener of context rather than a passive listener of content.
