So what is the secret to implementing social media? At the top of the list is, be real. So don't approach it as you would any other marketing plan, where you shoot for a broad audience and hope you capture some of it. All you have to do is to look at any of the major companies that put products on our grocery shelves and think about that feeling of too many choices, and you get to know that more is definitely not better. To be successful in social media, you have to care, really care about your audience. Be very respectful of their time and desires. People don't want to get eMail. They want to get meMail. They don't want you to fill their social media feeds with stuff they have to sort through because they're not interested. You have to figure out who cares about what you have to offer. And that's hard, really hard.

So while social media may very well be, in true hyperbolic fashion, the best thing since sliced bread, just like back when Wonder Bread brought it out, there were machines that had to be built, rebuilt and perfected. I always tell people who ask about what their social marketing plan should look like, to find the right content for the right medium... and it takes plenty of trial and error to do just that. We all must publish useful content if we hope to engage and have a positive outcome. It's sort of a no-brainer to recognize that to be effective in social media you have to connect on a direct human basis, which means you'll need to make a personal investment, as well as invest in those in your organization. To be effective in social media, you will need to invest in people resources.

Sliced bread caught on because of distribution, not because of the new idea of slicing it. Social media is the new, more convenient way to connect to people in our industry, to know if they want to "work" with us. What I've learned over the years is that while you are all happy to receive this Newsletter in your inbox and many of you respond to me personally, you don't like to respond publically in my blog. I know that. I respect that. I'm coming into your workspace the way you want. Like you, I have to continually focus on distribution to the right audience. So if you read this and like it most weeks, please do me a favor and let me know and maybe even send it along to a friend or colleague. Thanks!