I'd like to make a request: please be quiet. Don't say anything. Please don't say anything at all to the people you're trying to reach, and especially don't try to do it with social media tools. Don't even think about starting a blog or creating a YouTube channel or signing up for Twitter. Please don't begin a Facebook group, Flickr page or launch a podcast. Don't do any of these. Just be quiet, unless of course, you really have something to say.
Sure, a lot of people are using social media. According to Forrester's early 2008 data, 90% of Americans between 18-24 years old, 84% between 25-34 years old, 76% between 35-44 years old, and 72% of 45-54 year olds are using some kind of social media. Clearly, most Americans are online and using social media technology, but please don't let these numbers encourage you to begin engaging them in social media unless you actually have something to say.
So how will you know if you have something to say? Start with these:
- If you have truth to share, you have something to say.
- If you have an experience to draw from, you have something to say.
- If you know something I should know, you have something to say.
- If you can tell me about someone I should meet, you have something to say.
- If you have perspective where I am lacking, you have something to say.
The biggest misconception about social media tools is that they fix communication issues. They don't. They merely extend the reach of what you already have to say. Therefore, if you don't have anything to say already, you now have the opportunity to be equally ineffective to a larger number of people.
Social media doesn't consist of magic beans and pixie dust. It doesn't create something for you that wasn't there to begin with. If you're saying nothing today, you will say nothing in more places with social media. Your silence will be amplified and resound with a great hollowness that would echo for eternity if not for the absence of anything there in the first place.
My advice to anyone interested in social media tools is that they immediately forget about it. First, figure out what you actually have to say. What is the message? What compelling content do you have to offer? To what degree are you willing to engage in conversation openly and candidly with people who may want to talk to you?
These are the types of questions that are appropriate to get started. The wrong questions begin with choosing technology. The technology should fit the content, not the other way around.
Content, then, becomes your focus rather than the technology. Content is the basis on which people will measure you in social media. Good blogs have good content. Bad blogs have bad content. The content is not good because the blog is good. The blog is good because the content made it so.
As you consider social media as a means of reaching people, don't neglect the more important task of focusing on great content. Yes, you can reach far and wide with social media tools. Social media has become a useful and persuasive force. It's wide access and ease of use have created more opportunities for more people than media has ever provided in history. The case is compelling and seemingly irresistible, but if we want to reach people with these great tools and we don't do it with compelling content, then what are we really doing? We might as well just be quiet.