The People to People Connection
Social media attracts literate, intelligent, curious people — people who like to explore new ideas. Though some brand themselves as experts or gurus. In a industry barely defined, we’re all Social Media Explorers still learning the whys, hows, and ROIs. Folks new to the territory might find that the traits of the most qualified teachers aren’t what they would be in an older, more concrete type of enterprise.
Here’s what to look for in a social media teacher or guide.
- Count Internet years. 3 years experience is entry level in the concrete world. It can be extensive experience within Internet time.
- Check for depth. A deep understanding will show itself in the ways a person can describe the culture of the Internet, how it shifts, and how the values of social media worth within and against the values of ecommerce. Look for understanding how how social media as a piece of a comprehensive marketing / customer plan.
- Check for skill set. Even though the teacher may not be the person who’ll be executing the plan, he or she should be well versed in using the tools.
- Check the breadth, particularly the individual’s networks. Social media is business based in influence, relationships, and connections. Discuss how the networks match up to your business and its goals.
- Get the facts. Ask for cases and social media initiatives this person actively led.
The field, the metrics, and the best practices are still forming. Some folks have worked with the tools, but never applied them in actual P&L situations. Some have studied the theory. Some have built a narrow niche of expertise. While others understand how to move people all over the web, but can’t articulate it yet.
Many great minds and great practitioners are available to help. Know your goals and listen actively, the best match won’t be hard to find.
Let me know if I can help.
Liz Strauss
Want an hour of Liz’s personal consulting time? See the About Liz page.
Liz Strauss
Find out about working with Liz.
Connecting on a Human Level
When I meet with a new clients, it’s becoming easier to determine who’s going to be successful by the questions they ask and their approach to moving onto the web. People who understand the new social climate realize that it’s no longer about finding customers for their products, but about using their products to connect people to other people.
A great example is I Can Localize, a human and technology translation service for online businesses. Amir Helzer has built his business with people connections in mind. He understands that the single act of putting together a web presence in another language isn’t much more than a billboard. So, he offers personal translators — native speakers who know the culture — they translate any website incremental updates and provide time-sensitive responses to comments and contacts from customers. That allows his clients to stay connected to the people they serve in ways that are both time and cost efficient.
People talking to people . . . that’s real connection.
Social media is meant to be social. Are you connecting people to people?
Liz Strauss
Find out about working with Liz.
Pairing Sentences
When we learn to speak, it starts by listening. Google has started a global listening machine.
Google has announced it’s building a Translation Center to connect people who need text and documents translated with people who can do that. Such a central location for language conversation has fabulous implications for the Internet and the translation industry.
Amir Helzer, of I Can Localize a translation service that combines human and technological solutions, and I spoke about the Google Translation Center on Friday. Amir suggested that, looking at Google’s core business, it’s likely that this new center will function similar to Google AdWords — connecting buyers to seller without intervention. He and I discussed the nuances of accurate cultural translations. Amir pointed out that, “Now that Google has made this move, people are talking about the translation industry. It opens the door to a discussion of quality and standards and the value of providing a local feel to a global web business.”
Google will be collecting words in context to build what Brian McConnell has called a free global translation memory.
Google has been investing significant resources in a multi-year effort to develop its statistical machine translation technology. Statistical MT works by comparing large numbers of parallel texts that have been translated between languages and from these learns which words and phrases usually map to others — similar to the way humans acquire language. The problem with statistical MT is that it requires a large number of directly translated sentences.
Before we speak, we listen. Are you ready to start speaking and listening?
Global is the new local. Communication is relationship.
Liz Strauss
Find out about working with Liz.
The Larger Audience
The overwhelming difference about online communication seems to be that folks worry about who might be listening in the shadows — the readers we affectionately call lurkers. It’s easy to endow that unseen audience with power and mystery that they may not seek or want.
The point we miss that most all of our communication is subject to “lurkers” in some form or another, and because we’ve learned to manage for them, we no longer think about the threat they also pose.
Examples include conversations and secrets that get repeated after we’re gone, emails that get passed on, and industry gossip in which people talk about us and at times, even claim to represent our view.
In any business communication, the point has always been to be sure that what we share is appropriate and useful — and offered with care. Online communication works the same way.
Liz Strauss
Find out about working with Liz.
