The Passing of Generations and Social Media

Recently, I was presenting on a conference call about how to establish a social media program.

A participant asked a good question that gets to the heart of why we all should be using social media and I’ll share it with you.

The question was, “I have an established book of regular, reliable business.  My clients are older, senior executives and they don’t use social media.  I don’t feel a need to use social media.  However, they’re beginning to retire, I’m not yet ready to retire myself, and are being replaced by younger executives who are using social media.  Should I use social media to connect with these new managers?”

Just so there’s no misunderstanding here, my answer was, and is, “Yes, you should be using social media!”

As business people or professionals who are concerned about our brand and are looking to develop leads for future business, we must always be engaged on social media.

We should always be out there engaging in a conversation with our communities and be expanding our communities.

We should be demonstrating by our content why we are subject matter experts (SME) in our area of expertise.

We should be celebrating our accomplishments with solid recommendations from our delighted clients.

I like to recommend a book whenever I’m asked when’s the best time to start a social media program.

The book’s title is Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty: The Only Networking Book You’ll Ever Need by Harvey Mackay, the prominent sales coach and businessman.

This book was written just before the dawn of social media (Remember those days?) but Harvey’s principles about being ready with your network hold true today in the world of LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.  I encourage you to read it if you have any doubts about why you should start working on your social media program now!  (The title alone says it all but I feel bad about just quoting it without telling people to read the entire book itself.)

Younger executives will be on social media.  (Many of them may have been on it before some of my readers!)  They’ll expect to see you there.  I’ve met more than on executive recruiter who’s said that not having a LinkedIn profile is a red herring these days.  Your prospective clients will expect to see you on social media.  If they don’t find you then they’ll find your competitors!

There was another question from that conference call that was unsaid and I’ll ask it now.

Why have you waited until your clients have started to retire before you start thinking about social media?

Your brand and reputation should be a continual work-in-progress and not a knee jerk reaction to some event that you have no control over.

Also, undue reliance either on one client or one industry is always a high risk behavior.

There are really no good reasons not to have a social media program,  (Think you’ve got one?  Send it to me and I’ll take it apart for you!)

Business conditions change constantly, and not always with the predictability of someone announcing their retirement in advance of the event.

We need to always be ready and a social media program is a very good way to start!

That’s it for now!

In the meantime, thank you for following and reading my blog!

I look forward to any and all comments that you may have.  I will reply to any comments made to this blog post as promptly as I can.

Remember!

I do this for a living and if I can be of any assistance to either you or your organization, please feel free to call on me.  Our initial discussion will be of no charge to you.

I can also be reached at conpsweeney@someddi.com.

My Twitter handle is @conpsweeney.

Stay well!