I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what might be the defining “thing” that could change the tide for companies that are ready to embark on their own social media journey. Well, this morning as I was reading greg verdino’s blog, he has a section in there that points to the topics he speaks about, and one of the topics is called “are you ready?” he essentially is saying the following and I quote:
You can — but only if you’re ready to move beyond the old ways you’ve always done things, ready to rethink the fundamentals of how business happens, ready to embrace change and ready to take action.”
Great topic to talk about, but as I was thinking about it more, I’d like to add 3 more words to it, and it’s this.
“Are you ready to be human“?
Are you ready to leave your unending, take no prisoners drive, your ego, and your self serving ideals at the door and act like a human who can speak normally and speak one on one with your customers, with your employees and with your prospects? Sometimes we feel like we have to do this dance and we have to “act” like something that is completely alien to us. So let me ask you, when you want to make friends with someone, do you act the same way you do when trying to get a new client or new deal or contract? No..You act like a human, you act like yourself. Remember transparency? We talk about it for a reason.
Be Human. it works.
Direct Marketing Observations 
Some of the pretenses are precisely the same factors that work against transparent marketing. Occasionally, I get frustrated when people just don’t catch the hook on transparency and ethics. The biggest challenge I face is having to speak to PR/Marketers… trying to convince them that we are also consumers on a daily basis. And I walk away wondering, why do I even have to convince them to begin with?
Ed I responded by email to you but also wanted to add that maybe its an ingrained marketing mindest that is just impossible to change? I don’t know but it just boggles the mind as to who keeps telling them that the push mentality still works?
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I’m finding that people respond more to my services when I take care of them. Act like myself and I sell more. Try to be a sales person and scare people off.
I believe that we should all just be honest with ourselve about what we can do. But in the long run accept what we can’t. People will like you more for that than just being superficial.
Joel, so people respond to people? Imagine that! You bring up points that a lot of books seem to overlook. Thanks for sharing.