I'm 23 years old and I have no friends my own age. Even my future wife is eight years older than I am. Maybe I'm behind the times, maybe I just prefer to communicate interpersonally, or maybe I just like "Grown Ups," but when I talk to someone, I like to get the meat AND the potatoes. You just can't put a price on a firm handshake, good eye contact, and sizing someone up on that first impression. Whatever the case, I am certain I am the last millenial to blog. That's not to say I am not swift and well versed in the technological arts, just that until this point I have chosen not to participate in the wave.
I have to say, I have just recently joined the Twitter community and have been quite satisfied. This arena has given me the opportunity to connect and learn from professionals in my field in a matter of hours. These relationships that would otherwise take years to build have happened with the click of a mouse and 140 characters. Impressive! I question whether or not the sources of my information are credible....? What makes someone who blogs about a subject an expert worthy of 150,000 followers...? How do I keep up with all these conversations...? I just got e-mail on my smartphone, now I need to get facebook and twitter and every which gadget and app known to man...? Please...someone help bring this prehistoric millenial into the new era so that I can keep up with what is being talked about....
I guess, the big question I am asking here is this:
What do I need to do to stay on top of my Social Media networks in 2011?
Please Advise!
These are all good questions, but the first and most important question is what do you want to achieve? Why are you here? What are you hoping to accomplish?
ReplyDeleteEveryone has different ways to approach their Social Media reality. I do things in rather old fashioned ways compared to some. I don't subscribe to blogs usually - I go there manually. I don't automate anything on Twitter.
For me, it's about relationships and building a community. I use my blog as a way to start conversations, and I hope that people will want to join in. If not, then I try to find topics that will be more of interest to my community.
On Twitter, I am mostly just me. I try to be helpful, I try to be a source of information, but I also am fine talking about weather and the holidays.
Does that help at all?
~Margie Clayman @margieclayman
Well, I am going at it from two angles:
ReplyDelete1) A student - I want to learn from and network with like-minded professionals in my field and, like you said, start conversations to help with my second angle...
2) A Brand - My new job title is "Social Media Public Relations Specialist." I work for a very large company (12 Brands) and I am supposed to engage consumers via Social Media applications. My concern here is not philosophy of engagement, but rather, how can I stay on top of a high volume of activity while remaining authentic (non-automated). What technology, methods, and ideas do you have so that I can stay on top of so much activity?
Thanks Margie for your feedback!
-Kyle