Social Media Camp – Fred Sarkari

The keynote start with an interesting fact.  The average infant laughs 483 times per day.  An adult … 11.

Alright … let’s begin.

Social Media Camp

Keynote: What Is Social Media?

Fred Sarkari is the keynote speaker.  Her reminds us of some issues with social media:
Social media is a crutch.  Don’t forget the human element.  Too many business ignore the human element in exchange for social media.

There are three possible outcomes from a social media presence:

  1. Opportunity
  2. Opportunity passes you by
  3. Opportunity ruins your business

Warning: the human mind views success as being busy.  Too many people measure social media as a success when they are spending too much time on it.

It’s important to understand that we are no different than children.  We make decisions based on emotion and justify with logic.  When engaging in social media you need to understand that people are viewing with emotion.  Not everything needs to be perfect – we are human.

Similarly – we need to ask ourselves the same question children do … “Why?”  When engaging in social media it’s better then to do one or two things well than many poorly so ask “Why?” when looking at a new platform.

Rules For Social Media:

  1. Build relationships.  You can be replaced … your relationships can’t.  You need to be willing to put yourself on the line, express who you are and communicate with your audience honestly.
  2. Don’t be an ego collector.  Numbers don’t mean success.  You can buy fans but they’ll never buy from you.
  3. Invite eyeballs to home base.  Real interested visitors can pull their social traffic to their website/blog/etc.
  4. The BBQ effect.  Friends of friends are qualified/liked and trusted.  But if you turn on your fiends and try to sell them … they’ll feel betrayed.  Use social media to build trust and respect.  Invite them to your BBQ to meet you … the rest will follow.
  5. Be found.  Content, don’t post useless information (personal note – please please please listen to this one if I’m on your Follower list.  I don’t care that you’re having a coffee at Starbucks).  Gear your updates to what your audience is looking for.
  6. Partnerships.  They’re dangerous if you don’t develop the right partnerships but one or two of the right ones will change your business.
  7. Social media is like a cocktail.  If you order a cocktail you don’t want it diluted with ice.  Similarly, your followers don’t want your updates diluted with useless filler.
  8. Ask yourself: if you could be found by one specific person … how would you describe them?
  9. Return.  We spend so much time and resources getting people to us, don’t lose them.  Give them what they want.
  10. Do: Inspire people.  Educate people based on what they do, not what you do.  Help them execute their needs.
  11. Resources. What resources do I have?  Make sure you allocate them effectively.

Overall a very good presentation.  Covered the basics but sometimes a reminder there is spot on. 🙂