PETER SHANKMAN
| POSTED ON January 24th, 2011 | 35 COMMENTS | + ADD YOUR COMMENT |
“When did you become so paranoid?” “When they started chasing me.”
Ask any company who hasn’t yet dipped their toe into the social media cesspool ocean, and you’ll find that chances are, it’s not that they don’t believe in it, but rather, they’re afraid of “losing control of the message,” or “not being able to manage our brand online.”
In other words, they’re paranoid.
Below, five tips for dealing with five different types of Social Media Paranoid Bosses. (SMPBs)
1) “We’ll lose control of our message if we go online!”
You lost control of your message the first time the geek with the TRS-80 got on a BBS and told the three other people on it how much you sucked. Face it – You lost control of the message eons ago. For the first time, however, you have the ability to regain control of the message. You have the opportunity to respond, in real time, and fix problems before they become bigger.
HOW TO HANDLE: Set the paranoid boss up on Tweetdeck, and close the “post” window. Let them watch search windows of their brand name and competitor’s brand names for a week to get an idea of how it works. Then work with them to start responding. Baby steps.
2) It’s only for kids!
It amazes me that people still say this, but they do. Fact is, the fastest growing segment of Facebook is moms, 55-59, and the median age on Twitter is 39.5. It’s not 3lit3 d00ds using this stuff. And yes, I know you know that, but we’re talking about your paranoid boss.
HOW TO HANDLE: Set the boss up on Facebook or Twitter, and upload his address book. When he sees that all the guys he plays golf with at the club are already online, he’ll change his tune.
3) It’s too expensive.
No it’s not. There are way too many idiots running around calling themselves gurus and experts. That right there is a sign to run away from them. But, there are people out there who know what they’re doing. Scott Stratten. Chris Brogan. Steve Crescenzo. Me. And we’re all going to tell you the same thing: You don’t need to spend a ton of money on this stuff. You don’t even need to hire us if you don’t want to. Simply start with the basics and go from there. The usual suspects are all free. Show the paranoid boss that you can tie free tools into GENERATING REVENUE, and you’ll get a budget with which to do more. Simple.
HOW TO HANDLE: Use the free tools at your disposal before you hire an expert or contract an agency. Give yourself a timeline, and tie it back to REAL REVENUE. Be diligent.
4) It takes too much time
No it doesn’t. You don’t need to hire a full-time social media employee, at least not right away. What I do with my Blackberry, my Mac, and my a wifi connection can be done by anyone in your office, and it shouldn’t take more than 20 minutes over the course of the entire day. It’s listening first, listening second, and responding third. That’s it.
HOW TO HANDLE: Find the one person in the office who likes this stuff already, and work with them on ways to handle it. Read the multitude of blog posts on what tech is out there to help you accomplish what you need to the best.
5) We have a website. That’s enough.
No it isn’t. You know this. Now you need to show the boss that it’s not about your website alone. Sure, your website should be the cornerstone of your online presence. But to show that website, you need to find out where people are, and point them to it. And guess what – They’re not on your website! They’re on the usual suspects, going about their day, waiting to be marketed to in an appropriate way.
HOW TO HANDLE: Find a few ways to prove that a website alone isn’t enough. Compare the number of visitors on your site in a month with the number of fans a competitor has – Explain that social media is so much more than a website, yet done well, costs so much less. Show the boss that more people who will buy from you use the various social media outlets millions of times a day, and that those outlets are the biggest drivers of traffic to business websites out there – Even bigger than Google.
You can turn the paranoid boss into an ally by showing him that he’s worried about primarily nothing – it’s good to have a healthy dose of fear – but paranoia gets annoying really fast, and won’t help sales.
Any other ideas? I want to hear them below.
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Another great column/blog. |
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Great Post… I love it. These are all fears I hear on a daily basis about most of the technology we use and/or try to use to increase productivity. By the way does my boss know you are spying on him in his office? |
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When dealing with layers of “bosses” you have to start at the TOP ! Giving your boss the rundown on what is out there and needs to done takes time. Getting their ear for 20 mins can prove difficult. Preparing short demo’s upfront can really help. |
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Just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they’re NOT after me…! I think you’re right on, here, Peter. Just show and tell. Remove the mystique. |
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Excellent advice! Sometimes, convincing the boss to take the first step is the hardest one. And the visual is all-important, too. |
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Good info if the boss is afraid, but if company is dragging it’s feet, or avoiding social media, might be time to jump ship. Survival while ignoring social media is not impossible. There will be a few left in the future, but why risk it? If you boss isn’t coming to you and begging you to get more into social media, the odds are against you. |
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Excellent advice here. I teach public relations at a university and supervise a number of student internships. One young lady became very frustrated with her placement because the firm–one that puts on many charity events and social functions for high-dollar clients and has many swanky clubs and hotels among her client list–saw no reason to be on Facebook or have anything other than a (boring) website. I think #2 would be perfect for them, because once they saw how many of the socialites they work with are on Facebook and Twitter, they might see value in social media. As it is, she set up a Facebook page for them but we’re pretty sure it hasn’t been used since her internship ended in December. |
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Great read. Simple works best today. Thanks – It’s amazing how many businesses are missing an opportunity and how many leaders have not taken the time to “Get It”. Understand the revolution taking place in marketing. |
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Good stuff. |
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Great post, and so true! People will talk about you whether you are there or not. |
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I have experience the scared exec in a number of companies and the best way I have found is to ‘ask for forgiveness vs. asking for permission’ and just went for it. I treaded lightly and started on LinkedIn creating some discussions, optimizing my profile and just being there. I started to track the inbound traffic to our site from my activities and what happened once the visitor got there. I was able to demonstrate that social media was the second highest source of conversions from inbound traffic. While this was compelling data, I was given the ‘go ahead’ to keep up my work on LinkedIn but the company was still extremely scared of Twitter. Customer complaints that publicly facing are scary for execs and Twitter has become the go-to for complaining and reporting incidents. Execs should be scared but they shouldnt be so scared that they wont even have a presence. Makes me wonder how many complaints they get behind the curtain. Determined that there is no ‘cure’ for a bad product and a poorly managed company. And social media will just complicate things. |
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Good post, but there are two BIG hurdles many companies have beyond the clueless boss. The first is legal. The boss might be aboard but if legal squashes social media, it’s not gonna happen. While some lawyers are more open-minded than others, a by-the-books lawyer is the enemy of many a PR person. What is needed here is a CEO who can twist legal arms if necessary. The second reason is federal regulations. If you work in a highly regulated industry like finance, pharmaceutical, energy, etc., ANY company communication is subject to compliance review because it may run afoul of FINRA or HIPAA rules. If you have a sympathetic compliance team you can find some ways to work with this, but expect your strategy to get seriously watered down. |
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Thanks for putting this down to “paper”. This is so hard sometimes. |
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These excuses are pretty typical. To think that social media is just for kids is pretty crazy. Even if that was the case (which it isn’t)- don’t you want the younger crowd to be aware of your company too? After all, they will be around much longer. Social media is a great place to build your brand and get your name out there and noticed. |
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Love it! Social Media for Paranoid _____ [clients, prospects, bosses, co-workers, etc.]. Re: Point #5 – We already have a website: In 1996, that same boss would say, well we’re already in the phone book. Times have changed, behavior has changed. It’s not about what WE (the business) want, it’s what THEY (the customers) want. Nice post Peter. |
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Thanks for another great post! Goes for SMPCs (Social Media Paranoid Clients) too :) |
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Great idea for tweetdeck. My place of work doesn’t really even have their own website let alone social media files…it is a control issue for sure even though some of the bottle necking is age related fear of technology veiled with a multitude of other excuses. I gave up presenting options.. When they are ready they will ask. |
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Great solution to #4. The only way social media gets done in a truly effective way is to give it to someone who really enjoys doing it. Other wise task will go unchecked. |
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This is a good post, and like the approach of ‘hurdle vs solution’. These are greats steps for the beginners and companies who are starting to experiement, but experimentation quickly turns into solid efforts in this space and without two disclaimers, this will never work for them. 1. It’s not too expensive BUT it is not free. 2. It doesn’t take too much time BUT it does take dedicated time. |
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One of the complaints from my former boss was that if we provide a forum for people to have discussion then they will all know the “bad” things about us, and then when potential customers come to our place, they already know the “pain points” to complain about. I argued at least it gives us a venue to respond proactively, but what do you think about his concern? |
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Peter this is a great post. I was discussing this via email with someone today. I used Apple as an example because they shun Social Media. Steve Jobs loves having the tech geeks, twitterers, and blogosphere get all giddy about new products. They leak just enough info to set on fire a gazillion dollars worth of free exposure and chatter. But the lost with the IPad. With the IPhone it was perfect. It was such a different device nothing could be said prior to it’s release to underwhelm when hitting the stores. Then came the IPad. Rumors were running rampant via Social Communications Platforms. And what happened? The IPad underwhelmed. It got attacked from many fronts. No printing. No Flash. Its just an enhanced readers etc etc, It still sold like gangbusters to their core customer. But even now it has some PR issues and the competition is going to heat up fierce. Imagine how different it would be had Apple engaged via Social Communication and helped steer expectations and answered proper questions. I mean for Steve Jobs to have to put out technically a cold form letter on their website about why there is no flash? LOL Yes I know amazing to have the most successful valuable company of the last few years as a case study of what not to do! |
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David J. is correct about the legal and compliance hurdles. I have no doubt that even the most regulated industries will come around in time. The hesitation is not much different from what we went through when email first became popular almost 20 years ago. Regulatory agencies understand that the incoming generation and client demand for complete transparency makes the use of social media inevitable. FINRA has issued guidance and I keep it handy so compliance officers I interact with don’t have to dig around for it. I’ve linked it here: http://bit.ly/hYuN7D |
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I vote for #2 to be #1 :) |
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Excellent, Peter. Wanted to share a related post restating your point about losing/ regaining control of the message to amplify the discussion: http://domcrincoli.com/who-con.....ssage-now/ |
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