I use SMB’s as an example here, but when reading Todd Defren’s latest blog post, apparently it is something that permeates organizations both large and small. What is it?

What are companies (SMB’s) usually missing when jumping into the social media waters?

• They’re missing the point.
• They’re misunderstanding the commitment
• They think you can outsource it
• They think it’s a switch
• They don’t try as hard as they could
• They don’t measure it or…
• They measure the wrong things
• They lack knowledge
• They’re expectations are unrealistic
• They don’t give it enough time

That’s it.

But you know what the great thing is about all of the above bullet points? They all can be fixed.

How?

• Education. Education will help them get the point, but they need to know where to get that education. You can help them.
• Understanding the hard work involved will address a lot of the unknowns. We can all relate to what happens with hard work. But there needs to be an emphasis and a complete understanding of how labor intensive social media can be.
• You can outsource it, but it’s easier to understand when you don’t, the more you understand, perhaps the more capable you are of knowing what you can and cannot do internally.
• It is a switch but when you treat social media as such, others can tell, they see your lack of commitment-they see the half ass effort.
• If you don’t try, then what should you expect? I’ve always said, if you give 100%, then no-one can ever say that you didn’t try. You can take it out of the equation. But make sure you’re working smart.
• You measure your efforts when you sell, when you advertise, when you hire, when you buy etc. etc. so this is no different. You just need the right tools to measure the right things.
• Look up the definition of social media ROI and that will tell you what you should measure with social media.
• Social media changes daily; the tools, the sites and the cool things, they change daily. Stay current. Pick 10 sites and dump them into a reader and read it every day.
• Create reachable goals.  Teams and coaches create goals-you should be no different.
• Set up your expectations tied into your goals and give it all a legitimate time frame. But know it is a long term deal.

Now go get it done!