I was in a meeting yesterday with a highly respected group of people running a very notable local organization. It was a follow up meeting to a social media marketing pitch made by a business associate from another company. I was enlisted as the wingman. In a sense, I was the muscle, or the validator, or better yet, the street cred. The initial meeting with this group could not have gone any better. The plan(s) and the views offered in that first meeting were warmly embraced. There was a caveat though. They wanted more. They wanted specific details on how to roll it out. Fair enough. All positive signs.

Then I relaxed and let me friend down.

I assumed she had it under control; when I should have helped her to dig deep and develop a detailed more specific and actionable social media marketing plan. I didn’t.

Our meeting was pushed back, which pushed it further out of my collective conscience. Out of sight, out of mind, right?

I should have had her back. I was her wingman right? No excuse on my part. I should have really looked at the follow up document that she had crafted, and picked holes in it, but I didn’t. I should have thought about and anticipated the “push back” from the group, but I didn’t.

And they pushed back. As nicely as they could. But they pushed. They essentially came back with saying, “There’s not enough here”. And then they talked about ROI…and how they wanted to see it. And we, me? her? Didn’t map back precisely enough on what we were going to measure and how it was going to be measured. I assumed we’d get there, after they had said yes…

Could I have jumped all over their ROI concern? You betcha. And clearly here was my chance to pounce. and I didn’t. Because in a sense it was right there for the taking. I just assumed…

The bottom line is I barely uttered a word. Part of me wanted to and I sort of said something, but it was barely audible. I needed to be her calming voice in the storm of measurable ROI. I wasn’t. Subconsciously, I didn’t want to dominate her show, but I also didn’t want to engage in a lengthy discussion in the conference room at that time over the merits of social media measurement. Or maybe that is the place and time to have that discussion?

No it isn’t. It would take too long. And, in a sense, they were right. It will be the case of every single encounter that one has when trying to pitch and trying to win social media marketing contracts.

What are you going to do? How are you going to measure it? and what will be the results?

Assume nothing.

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