Augment your social media marketing efforts with honesty

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mechanics

Whatever you are doing for your clients right now isn’t enough. You may be doing what work’s for YOU because YOU know it works, but is it enough? Is it what is best for your client? Ok it may be, but I bet you, you could be doing more. Why do I think that? It’s simple and I’ll explain.

I was at a client meeting 2 weeks ago and  after everyone had cleared out, the president of the company asked me a question. It was one of those make or break moment type of questions too.

He asked me what I thought.

I sat there and was getting ready to go down a path I had gone down many times before. It was going to be the part-pitch, part-what-you- should-do type of comment, when I stopped and decided right then and there, to take a different approach.

I took a big breath.

I decided to tell the president that if I owned this project/company, if this was MY company, this is what I would do.

I told him what I would do and why. It wasn’t the I’m good at what I do rant, it was the “this is broken and its not working and I need to fix it type of comment”.  It was the, “here’s what I need to do to make it right comment”.

Simple, honest and dead on.

Guess what? It worked!

A lot of what I was referring to were elements of social media that needed to be in place to make an already thriving community/website more interactive and more conversational. Did it need to be radically changed? No. A new website? No. An overhaul of a social  media presence? No. It didn’t need any of that. It needed some tweaks and some changes in strategy, that’s all. What it needed was a dose of reality sprinkled with honesty.

At the end of the day, it’s not about bangin’ the client for as much as you can get, or getting the project at any cost, or saying what they want to hear. It’s about you being honest and seeing the challenges of running a business from the perspective of the business owner.

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5 thoughts on “Augment your social media marketing efforts with honesty”

  1. Hi Marc,

    I’ve always operated under the philosophy that my role as a consultant is to tell clients what they need to hear, not necessarily what they want to hear. If you’re lucky, they mesh. If you’re not, they hire someone else and you’re lucky too because they’re probably not the right client for you.

    Besides, there are lots of potential clients, but you only have one reputation. As you said, at the end of the day it’s about being honest and adding value one interaction at a time.

    Best,
    Daria

  2. Hi Marc,

    Always keeping it real and giving good advice. If you’re not being honest, you’re not providing value. What’s the point then?

    At the end of the day, you will be judged by results… these speak for themselves – can’t fake that.

    Appreciate your words of wisdom.

    Mark

  3. @mark Amazing what happens when you stick to some tried and true value system in business. Ethics and morals still have a place.

  4. @Daria, I agree, as much as I want the business, any and all, sometimes its just not the right fit. i’d rather be up front and honest than struggle…

  5. Pingback: “Listening, honesty and how you’re screwing up” - Box Scores: June 15-21 | Deep Bench

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