Note: This is the second in a series I'm writing to directly address those with whom I've had some great conversations in workshops and meetings. The preamble in the first post of this series explains what I have in mind. I hope you'll check back regularly or, better yet, subscribe. You can do that either via the RSS feed or email in the right sidebar.
In the previous post I left off by previewing thoughts I've shared with others who are looking to start wading into social media. Where to begin?
Curiously, my thoughts here don't always start with recommendations about social networking platforms. Rather, they begin with a nod to something very low tech. Not much more than paper and pencil.
Beginning With Purpose
Borrowing from Stephen Covery's philosophies about being proactive and beginning with the end in mind, I think it helps for each of us to first put pencil to paper about our purpose. Part of our answer here relates to what it is we hope to accomplish for ourselves or our business by wading into the online social sphere.
Without clear and concise statements about these points, we run the risk of falling into the trap of aimless exploration. That’s what I call the scratch we itch when we’re presented with a shiny new thing to explore. This might come to us through our own web-browsing activities, or the well-intentioned sharings from friends and colleagues suggesting an interesting new social media tool or application that we should sign up for and begin using.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I'm not saying exploration isn’t worthwhile. After all, many successful companies are just that because they allocate a portion of their capital to budgetary line items such as “research and development.” I happen to believe we should make similar investments of time into our own research and development efforts as new social media platforms come on the market. But, when we do, we should do it with the temperament of purpose.
Writing your purpose statement
Your purpose statement, then, articulates:
- What you do,
- For whom you do it,
- How you do it.
Armed with that, you'll be in a better position to evaluate which social media platforms are right for you to invest your time. And, more to the point, which communities and/or groups within each platform you should commit your time and resources.
Step 1: What is it that you do?
Unless you've got a lock on this already, try approaching this as a brainstorming activity. With paper and pencil in hand, take no more than five minutes to quickly list all the things you do in your business. For example, for my friends in the real estate industry, a partial list might appear as follows:
- I negotiate contracts.
- I counsel home buyers about the home buying process.
- I creatively market homes to get the best price for my selling clients.
- I serve my clients and their families.
- I create long lasting relationships.
After you've created your initial list, make note of some of the action words. These give a clue about the things you give attention to in your business. For example, from the list above you might make note of the following action words:
- I negotiate contracts.
- I counsel home buyers about the home buying process.
- I creatively market homes to get the best price for my selling clients.
- I serve my clients and their families.
- I create long lasting relationships.
Step 2: For whom do you do what you do?
In this step, take another look at your list and pick out the nouns representing people or groups. Don’t be shy about adding to your list if something new comes to mind. Using our example above, your refined list might look like this:
- I negotiate contracts (with lenders, buyers, sellers, and their agents).
- I counsel home buyers about the home buying process.
- I creatively market homes to get the best price for my selling clients.
- I serve my clients and their families.
- I create long lasting relationships (with agents and clients alike).
As afterthoughts, the list above might jog your thinking to add the following:
- Other agents.
- Investors.
- Generation-Y buyers.
- Baby-boomer sellers.
Step 3: How do you do what you do?
Continue the process of refining your list. Only this time, focus on descriptive words you’d use to describe your unique approach to service your customers. Examples here might include:
- Skillful and ethical negotiation.
- Consultative philosophy of service.
- Seeking first to understand my client’s situation before I seek to be understood. (Again, borrowing from Stephen Covey’s principles.)
Step 4: Assembling the pieces
Now, as a final exercise, try forming a few sentences using some of the nouns, verbs and adjectives in the steps above. This part of the exercise will be a little like trial-and-error. You’ll likely follow an iterative process as you combine words into meaningful statements that ultimately resonate with what you feel are true about the value you and your business add to the community.
Furthering the real estate business scenario, I did a quick search for compelling purpose statements written by real estate agents. Here's a good one that resonated with me. This one's attributed to Debbie Calvin from her web site.
“To serve families and create long standing relationships with people for their real estate needs.
To ensure that every family who has entrusted me as their Realtor is provided with real estate services that reflect knowledge, integrity and commitment.
To continuously understand how important my job is in the lives of others and to “awe” them with my performance while making the most of their hard-earned equity.
To always remember that not only is a home most likely the single largest investment of the average family, but a home is where families build their lives.
To always remember that my job is that important.”
I love it. Here are a few things that stand out for me:
- What: To serve... (to) create long-standing relationships.
- For whom: Families.
- How: ...(by providing) real estate services that reflect knowledge, integrity and commitment... to "awe" them with... performance while making the most of their hard-earned equity.
Movin' On
With these steps complete, write your statements on a clean sheet of paper and keep them in front of you. They should serve as guiding principles, not only for your business, but also for your business-related activities with social media.
Your purpose statement will help when you're asked--either by friends, colleagues or that other part of yourself--to deviate from your path by "taking a look" at new social networks or automation tools because of some wonderful new shiny promise of relationship building, or other.
With each new invitation, ask yourself if that application, network culture or user-base fits with the vision you hold about your customer and your business.
This vision becomes an important tie-breaker when you later find yourself wading into the online social stream and begin experiencing the fuzzy logic of shortcuts and automation. These are distractions of the type that tempt you to consider automation in building lots of followers quickly, automating your “DMs”, playing Mafia Wars, or to accept a connection simply because “…you are a person I trust…”.
By having a clear idea of what you do, how you do it, and for whom, you’ll be better equipped to use social media as an enabling tool for your business, rather than as a crutch for it.
