Stop doom scrolling and start having conversations

Genuine online connection is helping us cope whilst we are stuck at home.

Don’t expect people to know who you are, where you are, what you need.

Reach out, find your people and interact, give value. 

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The Art of Social Media, Guy Kawasaki

If You Prefer To Read Your Content

I’m recording this on Monday 22nd ready for tomorrow 23rd March 2021 and spring is in the air, windows wide open nice fresh air. 

Today I would like to talk about how to find your community on social media. 

Byeline: Stop Doom scrolling and start having conversations, which I think is key. 

So first of all my little intro, 

I’ve not been out of the house. Can you believe it? 

I’ve just been so busy, and I’ve got loads of writing done. I’m thrilled that this new genre is working out for me. 

All the analytics that I’ve been studying seem to be showing that it’s working, and my new network of mentors and mentees, we’re all helping each other, really coming together so I’m pleased about that. 

It’s given me lots and lots of energy to finish the editing on my novel.

I’ve realised that I say ‘so’ a lot in this podcast, and I’ve noticed that in dialogue when I’m writing a start an awful lot of conversations with the word ‘Oh’ so I’ve been going through and deleting that.

‘Edit find’ is really helpful for things like that, to find every different point where I’ve put it. I’d like to know what words you use, that you’ve not really noticed because I think we all have them. 

‘That’ seems to be a very overused word in the English language. 

I’ve self published a book, a collection of short stories out too within the new genre, so we’ll see how that goes. It’s always helpful to have a goal. 

Don’t just keep throwing things I’ll put that in this episode about. 

Don’t just throw things out on social media for no reason. Because you need to know what your why is and why you’re doing things, because life is just so hectic and so busy now. 

You don’t have to have a reason for everything in life but with social media, it’s always good to know why you’re putting content out there and what your result is. What you expect from it, even if that’s just a network of friends, that’s fine. 

I’ve got a Patreon episode coming up shortly and I’ll remind you at the end of the episode as well. 

If you’ve any questions either from previous episodes or from this one, then please put them in the comments or drop me a DM and let me know and I will answer that in the Patreon episode. 

Okay, so let’s dive into 

How To Find Your Community On Social Media. 

As I’ve already mentioned Simon Sinek explains that most businesses start with why. And I’m not just talking about business today. It might be that you want social media for social reasons, to keep your sanity when you’re on your own in lockdown, even though lockdown is opening up, a lot of us are still in our homes. 

It might be that you want to use social media purely as a friendship medium, which is fine. 

To catch up on news and trends. 

To watch your mentors or your coaches, it’s a really good way of getting free coaching from people in extremely high positions, you can follow them on social media and see what’s happening and what they’re forecasting for the future or what they expect you to be doing now.

For business, an awful lot of social media now is obviously for business. 

We’ve seen that in lockdown over the past year, the companies who point blank refuse to get involved online are the ones that are going under. 

The future is on the Internet, whether you like it or not. Keeping up with how to communicate with companies that you like, how to support businesses, whether they be small local cafes on the corner, you can still support them online. Whether it’s a big company that you’d like to stay in business because you think the service is good. 

First of all we’ll dive in to a few hints about social media. The name gives away, social. The hint is in the title, social media, you need to be social. 

You can’t just drop and run. Stick a post out once a week, and then complain that you’re not building any network, that you’re not meeting anybody online, and especially in business that just doesn’t work you need to be social. 

The first thing I would say before anything else, is I know there’s a lot of fear around it, don’t get dragged into spam and there’s loads of scammers out there. 

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There are delete, block and report functions in every version of social media, every different company has them, and you can use them.

They’re easy to use so don’t be fearful of social media. 

If you see something dodgy you can report it, something offensive you can report it /block it. 

Scammers are out there the same as they are on every street corner, and every high street, so don’t worry about it. Just be sensible, and we’ll come on to that later. 

You’re going to build some positive connections. It’s not going to be scammers and spammers, you can block them, but you can make friends, you can find clients. 

You can find mentors and coaches. You can find the news, and magazines and blogs, and instead of going to your local shop like back in the day when you used to pick the newspaper or magazine on a Friday or Saturday morning. 

I used to work in a newsagent and we always used to have the regulars that came in and picked up the same magazines every week, that’s what’s online. 

You can use it for whatever you choose. 

The main thing is to be authentic and genuine. Don’t try and pretend that you’re something you’re not. 

Don’t try and pretend …

I actually answered the question the other day on social media, somebody asked, 

‘What is it about you that people misunderstand?

All my life, people have assumed that I’m outgoing. It wasn’t until I was in my 40s that I realised I’m actually an introvert, and that was one of the reasons I used to get so stressed, after meetings, and after conferences, because I’d been forced into that social situation. I get my energy from being alone…

Be authentic and be genuine and don’t pretend to be something you’re not because people will see through it, and you don’t want inauthentic connection.

Especially if you’re in business you want to find people who resonate with you who have the same ethics as you, who want the same results as you.

Whether that be recycling, no plastic, only ordering from the country that you live in whatever it may be, you want authentic connection, and that’s what you need to seek out. 

Don’t expect people to find you. 

You can’t just sit at home behind your phone, and think everybody will know where you are, because they won’t. 

I see a quite a few people who are scared of flooding social media, and you can’t. Some people on Twitter post 10 and 12 times a day. it doesn’t mean that you will see 10 or 12 of their posts, you’ll probably only see one, if that. So don’t worry about being out there too much.

7:58

Not at first anyway. 

You need to find your niche, whether that be social or business. 

I think in America it’s called [nitch] niche, but its [neesh] niche in England, and you need to find that.

It might be social, patchwork, a particular type of dog or cat, geographically where you’re located, hiking. 

Whatever your hobby is there will be groups out there, networks out there that you can meet and make friends with. 

With business especially the scattergun approach doesn’t work. 

If you’re aiming at everybody, you hit nobody. 

And that’s why the niche is so important. 

— In the US there’s a saying, the riches are in the [nitches] niches, but in UK the [reeshes] riches are in the [neeshes] niches doesn’t work!—

Remember, try not to be friends with everybody because you can’t be. 

There will be people you really don’t want to be friends with, so don’t worry about that, that’s fine. 

If you’ve got absolutely no idea about social media and some haven’t. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. 

Listen back to my episode number #003. 

That was about the basics of social media about Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn just explaining why each one is there and what you can use it for. 

Please please please don’t say you’ve left it too late and that you can’t go on social media because you just don’t get it, what’s the point, I’m too old. 

Definitely definitely definitely listen to my episode #002 about not using your age as an excuse. 

The news is online, whether you like it or not, all your bills, or your household maintenance future developments politics, everything is online and social media is a huge part of that.

It is fantastic value, it gets a lot of negative press, but it has kept an awful lot of people in touch, especially over the past 12 months, and will continue to do so. 

Don’t be frightened of it. 

Don’t say that you’re too old because you aren’t, no matter what age you are.

If the age excuse is something that you sort of constantly find yourself throwing out listen to the other episodes of this podcast as well.

It drives me crazy when people say they’re too old, because you’re not. 

I’ve set up basic training for social media. 

For those mid lifers who do feel they just don’t really understand what’s going on and they want the real basics. 

There’s no judgement. If you don’t know you don’t know. There’s no shame in that. 

If you want to start, set up the basics, I go through Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, there’s various other platforms, but the training is explaining what each is for and to help you set up your basic first profile and getting you up and running. 

If that’s of interest, go to my website, which is www.christieadamswriter.com and on homepage you’ll find details of all of my coaching programmes, including the social media one. 

It might be that maybe you’ve got two or three friends that you’re all in the same boat, and you want to work together, we can do a group session. 

I’m going to give you a call to action. 

I really want me to do this because I don’t want you to procrastinate and put things off.

I want you to choose a social media platform, whether that be Facebook, Instagram, etc, as I’ve mentioned already, but just choose one. 

Then I want you to go in and I want you to update all your profile image header image, 

your description,

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whatever that particular platform needs.

I want you to go through an update, which you should be doing regularly anyway because it can get a bit distorted and we change.

As people we develop and we grow, and you’d be amazed how quick things get out of date, so go in and update the profile. 

Then for the next week, at least, just to see how it goes. I want you to go on every day, onto that platform, you don’t have to do it once.

If you choose to you can go on breakfast, dinner and tea time, sometimes that’s a handy way when you’re cooking. 

It’s a reminder that we can just drop something online, that’s why there’s so many pictures of food online! Everybody thinks of it when they’re in the kitchen. 

Go on, everyday, and post something of value, something that means something. 

It might be a quote that resonates with you, it might be a picture of your tea whatever, but give some value. 

Because ultimately, people are busy, we’re all busy, aren’t we?

We need to know what’s in it for us. People are quite selfish in that way. 

You need to appeal to them, give them a recipe or an idea or inspiration or a quote, you know, that might just motivate somebody, or it might be something else.

Whatever you want to post whatever you choose, keep it in line with your niche.

If you want to reach out to cat owners and want to make friends with a lot of cat owners, then putting a dog picture out isn’t gonna attract cat owners really, unless it’s got a cat sat on it! 

Just think about it, what you’re posting, does it line up with the type of people that you want to reach out to? 

Then I want you to reach out on that social media to find 10 people. 

I can explain how to find those 10 in the training, but I want you to reach out to 10 different people. 

Imagine it’s like real life that you’ve gone out for the day. 

You meet people in cafes, behind the counter in a coffee shop, in shops behind the till, at work, in the gym, on the bus, on the train. 

You meet people all the time and you say hello, some of them you’ll have a conversation with some of them you won’t you’ll just nod and move on. 

That’s what you’ve got to imagine social media is. 

Being social with people, just reach out to 10 people. It might be that one of their posts is really attractive to you, you comment on it, like it and share it.

Instead of just clicking retweet or share, put a comment with it. 

Add value.

Give that person something to encourage their connection. 

My warning is basically be safe online. 

Please don’t put your home address on there. 

I did contact somebody recently where they’ve moved house which is great, but they put all the internal design of the home, and a photograph of them with their door number on it. 

Don’t forget, your phone is geotagged. 

You’re basically telling every single person on the internet, where you live and what your house is like, it’s not a good idea. 

Be safe, do some research on how to keep safe online. 

Block and report anybody that is being offensive or any scammers, just the same as you would if you got a scam email from a bank, you know, somebody pretending to be a bank, you know, you’d probably report that to your own bank.

Book Recommendation:

The Art of Social Media, by Guy Kawasaki. 

It’s an iconic book, it’s a really good one. It’s the basics, not a new book, some of it may be a little dated but the basic theory is the same and it is a really easy book to read.

He’s an icon in the industry.

Finally, I would like any questions. As I mentioned at the beginning, I do a Patreon episode for my patrons that’s exclusive once a month.

I’ll be recording that next week, and I would like any questions that you’ve got, so that I can answer those for patrons. 

I’d like to know what your chosen platform is why you like it, why you don’t like other ones, and I can feed that into my training.

Thank you for joining me, and I will catch you next time. Bye.