I was at a networking event and one of the other people approached me and told me how frustrated she felt about learning social media and how everyone had a choice about using or not using social media. While I agree that businesses do have a choice when it comes to using social media, I also think it’s inevitable that businesses will need to develop a social media policy and presence. In other words, businesses have the choices for now, but at some point, the choice to not be involved in social media will hurt the business because the competition will use it for their success.
All that said, when I encounter people who are very resistant to social media, I don’t try to argue them into using social media. I may offer some education if they want it, but I realize that they are emotionally invested in not using social media and that trying to get them to change their position will make them more resistant.
The problem I see all too often is that social media enthusiasts don’t understand why some people aren’t enthusiastic about social media. What they fail to realize is that the people who aren’t enthusiastic about social media look at it as just one more thing that has to be done to run a business and on top of that, there’s technology involved, which means learning to fiddle around with interfaces and other tools that may or may not work and involve some kind of learning curve.And beneath all that is simply the emotional response, which may be fear over the changing times or the turbulent economy.
The best approach is to simply educate about social media and then let the person think about it and get back to you about it when s/he is ready to do so. That way you can let that person come to his/her own understanding of social media and how it fits into their business. And believe me, at some point the person will come around or change his/her mind when s/he realizes that other businesses are benefiting from social media and that s/he is losing out on getting in front of people using social media.
When that person realizes that social media isn’t goign anywhere and it can be beneficial to business, then you will hear from him/her. Don’t do an I told you so. Help the person step out into the social media webiverse and get comfortable with it.
