We have had an exceptional response to our Social Media 101 series (Facebook; Twitter). In fact, I met with a client the other day, a senior executive at a high-profile organization, who told me that he really appreciates the series because it is helping him to better understand social media tools, technology and tactics. He laughingly told me: “I kind of have to fake it a bit when my team talks about social media because I know so little and I don’t want to admit that to them.” And he said that our series is giving him the basics, so now social media is starting to make sense to him – and that means more productive meetings with his staff.
People like this client are exactly why we are producing this series. Many people understand social media, but there are also others who don’t. In our experience, there are many senior executives – CEOs, presidents, executive directors, general managers, vice presidents, directors and senior managers – who may have limited knowledge or understanding of social media in general. Some of these professionals may even work in the marketing or communications departments or divisions and, because of their leadership role, they don’t get as involved in the use of social media as others who handle the day-to-day activities. Because of this, they feel like they don’t know enough about social media and, often, they don’t really want to publicly admit this because they are in senior positions.
It’s a tough spot to be in. These are smart, engaged professionals. It can sometimes be challenging for them to grasp even the basics of social media because they are busy and social media technologies and tools change so rapidly and regularly. This blog series – Social Media 101 – aims to help anyone who is struggling with social media basics to understand the networks and use them a bit better. We know we can’t be everything to everyone, but providing a brief overview with a little bit of context of how social media is being used today seems to be useful to quite a few people – from the feedback we have heard.
With that in mind, after asking a few people who expressed interest in this series, we have a list of the topics that we are going to cover here over the next few months. If there is something you would like to know about that isn’t listed here, please send us a message and let us know.
Upcoming Social Media 101 posts are:
- LinkedIn (including LinkedIn Pulse)
- YouTube
- Google+
- Snapchat
- Vine
- Tumblr
We will, of course, be updating this list as needed. And, if it continues to be popular, we may go back and revisit it, adding specific ways to use these networks to engage your stakeholder groups and communities.