You know that person who won’t get himself, herself, or their business or organization on Facebook because people play farming and mafia and fish tank and poker games on there?
Here’s what I’d like to know:
Mailbox Hit and Run, photo by Lars Plougmann
Did that same person remove their mailbox from their business office, or even at home, because they received unwanted mail?
Did that same person rip the land-line telephone out of the wall because a relative kept calling them at work?
Did that same person delete their email account when they received forwarded nonsense disproven by Snopes?
Did that same person cancel their cell phone contract because of the calls they got from people trying to dial the previous owner of the phone number?
Of course not! 
And yet professionals of every stripe still use similar rationales to avoid establishing a professional presence on Facebook, the world’s most highly trafficked website – or second most, depending on the week.
Professionals want to know that their time – ultimately, the most valuable and precious commodity they have – will not be wasted on Facebook. That’s a completely valid concern, and it’s why we take people’s Facebook hesitations seriously.
But to dismiss Facebook because millions of people (professionals among them!) occasionally use it for frivolous purposes is like throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
So, if you’re one of those folks pooh-poohing Facebook…what would you need to see to change your mind about it?
And to think, this was a mild day! 15mph winds took out most of the audio – thankfully, YouTube’s annotation/subtitle feature covers the rest. As soon as you here me say “home of the ‘World’s Worst Weather,’” go ahead and mute your speakers, because you can’t hear much of my voice after that. (Hope you enjoy the scenery, though.)
Thanks to the tireless, round-the-clock-working employees and volunteers at the Mount Washington Observatory and Discovery Center for inviting me up to their stunning and gadget-laden aerie. This video gives a brief summary of some of the online reputation management topics I covered during a presentation for them during their annual all-staff meeting. Great day, great people!
For our Facebook readers, you can see the full video on the Aha Yourself! channel at YouTube.
A deep thought for your business – and your life – thanks to a simple question from a boy perched on his Dad’s shoulders.
(Psst – you reading this on Facebook? They hid the video from you. Don’t worry, though, we found it for you.)
“THEY” say people are talking about you, your business, your brand, your products, your industry, your competitors, and all sorts of other things interesting to you as a business owner or passionate professional on Facebook…never mind who “THEY” are for a moment.
So thanks to a lovely webinar by Mari Smith, co-author of Facebook Marketing: An Hour a Day, and co-founder of the 2010 Social Media Success Summit, here’s a great little tip for finding out what people are saying about your biz on Facebook. (Along with a nice meta moment about the Facebook book.)
BTW, yes, “THEY” told us you can’t see the video if you’re reading this on Facebook. So try this YouTube link instead, please!
There’s a famous story about Henry Ford and the invention of the V8 engine in the early 20th century. Ford’s engineers told him it wasn’t possible, but he believed it was, and set out to make it a reality.
That took place in the latter part of the Industrial Age. Here, in our idea-driven economy, you have more opportunities than ever to work from “What’s possible?” as your inspiration, and find the right team to take care of the “how” for you. Here, some thoughts on that as it relates to new-fangled social media platforms…
If you know how it’s possible to import RSS feeds to Facebook and still see the embedded video, we’d love to talk to you. In the meantime, here’s the workaround to see it.
