Doing Online, well, Wrong

Doing online (traditional, social, 2.0/3.0, ) right has a variety of meanings, and can vary from market to market, product to product, even person to person. There isn't really a "right" answer, there is just doing Online Well, and even that is a qualitative analysis at best. But, there are some things about online marketing and promotion that can be described as just wrong. Let's leave aside the obvious ones like all out spamming, and purposely or inadvertently becoming linked on or to porn (unless of course, that is your business).
As social media and new media technology becomes increasingly popular in the B2B space, and trickling down to the SME B2B space, there are companies that want on this bandwagon, but don't experts on their team, there are some pretty big mistakes that can be made.
2.0 and social media marketing is by it's nature open to much more public critism than traditional methods, therefore attention to your message, media, and tone are more important than ever. Here is my take on some of the just plain Wrong ways of going about things.

1. Having no content other than your (often outdated) brochure. Would you like to have a Facebook page for you company? Have people become fans? Cool. FB is beoming a standard in companies online strategies, and can work well. You need to be sure that the content you are putting up is new, informative, and fresh; give your readers (and hopefully FB Fans) something to be excited about.

2. Disregarding your core Brand and/or Message. Just because you are playing in new media, doesn't mean you should completely abandon the ideas, messages, and packaging that have made up your business thusfar. By playing a theme that is out of tempo to the rest of your overature, you will simply alienate the very message that you wanted to keep tied to your company.

3. Being a one-trick pony. New media is in a large part about capturing a viral wave in the internet ocean. Like any good surfer will tell you, if you only paddle out to one spot every day, your chances of catching a wave aren't very good. You need to repurpose your message for a variety of mediums. Do you have a great White Paper? Cool, now grab the best bits of that and write a great blog. Can you make a video related to some of that content? Do it. Is there a new idea or technology that people can become Fans of on Facebook? Make page or even a group. Are there related topics or macrotrends that your original whitepaper can offer insite to? Look them up, and participate in their forums. Social media is not a one shot deal, or a quick fix.

4. Faking it. Do not, I repeat, do not pretend to be someone or something that you are not in social media. Do not make a facebook account pretending to be a person, when indeed you are a business. Do not pretend to be an anonymous or impartial forum poster and respond to blogs or postings about your business or related topics. You will get caught. The results are never good.

5. Spamming. This goes beyond traditional spamming (buying/finding/stealing email lists and sending out mass mails - don't do this. No, don't.) and includes putting your ad/website randomly as a comment to a blog post, forum posting, facebook group, etc. If you have valuable insights on a topic, add them. Include a link if it will help the community in the particular topic being discussed. But if you are putting a link just to put the link, and not adding any immediately available and directly related comments or content, just don't. Worse, do not post your company's website where it is totally unrelated. Commenting on a great article on nuclear energy? Great, just don't include a link to your dog grooming business. That's just irritating.

It's a brave new-ish world, but not one to be feared. A great deal of WOM is driven by altruism and the notion of providing goodwill to the community, and even the company. That being said, my last bit of advice: Don't be a dick. What goes around, comes around is faster, and more true than ever.

Be Stubborn

I like to draw paralells in life. It helps me deepen my understanding about things, simple or complex, but more importantly, it often opens up different angles for looking at ideas or problems. I'm a runner. I'm not new to running, but I am new to putting any distance to it. I plan to run the 30k around the bay road race in Hamilton on the 30th of March. I learned the hard way that you don't just decide to go from 10 or 15 k to trying out the 30, and I ended up in tears at km 23 of my pre-run of the course. There is a plan to getting to the 30k; it's been cooked up by a specialist who does these things, and it is a menu of runs of different lengths and speed that should get you through the race sans tears.
It's important to note that this is Canada. More important is that the training plan takes you running 4-5 days a week through the months of January, February, and now, March. This particular year, the weather just sucks. It hasn't just been cold, it's been windy, snowy, sleet-y, rainy, ice pellet-y. In my lifetime I don't recall such a rash of just plain bad weather. And still, I run. Why? Because I want the goal. I set the goal, I want the goal. Heck, I'm not even looking forward to the running part. The course isn't nice, it ends in hills, there's going to be 5549 other people jostling around me, and I don't have a running partner. BUT I WANT IT. Is it perserverance? Naw, that would be too "Rudy" of a word for me. I'm just plain Stubborn.
During my last run, I began to think about the Startups, and my own recent foray into working without a boss. I though about how many people must start, but don't make it. And I thought, I bet those who get to their Startup dreams would probably be out here running in the windy-sleety "snow-rain" nightmare, if the race was their goal. Starting Up can't be easy. There are people who tell you that your idea sucks, or that you'll never get off the ground; there are times when money's tight, and planning or development is stalled (or going backwards!); there are times when vendors can't deliver on time, or what they give you is crap..... and worst of all, there are times when you just plain feel like crap yourself, and you have no idea what you were thinking getting into all of this, and you doubt that you have the talent to make it fly, and you aren't even sure the goal is worth it. These are the times when no "chin up! you-can-do-it mom-style cheery optimism" is going to cut it. I'm gonna try treating it just like the running, with the consistant actions that are going to get me to the goal; the crappy running in the sleet. Me, I'm gonna Be Stubborn. I'm gonna do it just because I said I was gonna do it.

It's all New, Kids

Things have changed. I no longer work at a large Canadian success story, and I'm investigating what life might be like not to be tied to a regular gig; a sure thing. But it's more than that. I've stumbled on a new place, and a new perspective, and by finding this have re-ignighted that fire that I was known for; that cracker-jack spark that people would tell me about, but that I thought lived in everyone. Neat-o.

What is this brave new world? Startups. Startups and pseudo startups (former startups looking for the next big thing; the diversion from n+1 product development within their own companies). Ideas mashed with spirit, searching for the tools to make the dreams come alive. I know, I know, very Lewis Carroll. Some might argue that there is no fairy dust, but for me, right now, I disagree. Compared to a corporate world where 100+ hours a week go into seemingly benign tactics supporting someone else's dream, and your biggest reward is your paycheck and not getting ripped by an overworked VP, Startup Land might as well be Neverland.

But as far as I can tell, the world is new for the startups, too. With seemingly endless places to turn for community thanks to the web 2.0 tools that many are hoping to add to with their own endeavors, and ultra-cool (but not in the Swingers, Money Baby flavor; but it could be Swingers 2.0... perhaps more on that another time) gatherings of like-minded dreamers, dreamer helpers (read: Tools and Money) and wannabe dreamers at BarCamp, DemoCamp, StartupCamp around the country and the world, getting the stuff from lab to reality is bound to be faster than ever. Community driving innovation. No bubble-boy, plastic coated, locked up, class 100 clean rooms here. Lay bare your idea (and your soul in some cases) for the world to see, publicly critique, and yes, HELP. Yeah, yeah, your big secret is then out there, for someone to steal and make their own. Secrecy be damned. As Austin Hill, Canadian entrepreneur and angel investor said at StartupCamp Waterloo on Tuesday (and I paraphrase because I took poor notes) If you have thought of it, so has someone else. Do it anyway.