I like to be blunt, and honesty is not something that should ever be bargained away. With that said, it’s my experience that most of the agencies (both new and old) involved in social media are posers. The monotony of people crowing about social media, and yacking at clients about the beauty behind it while not embracing it themselves is the darkest kind of hypocrisy. No wonder we have a hard time selling people on the concept of business within social media when one of these clowns takes someone for a ride.

Recently, Forrester’s projected that marketing within social media was likely to see a 34% increase in spending on average per year through 2014. However, Forrester’s also states that marketers find it increasingly difficult to trust established agencies with their social media campaigns and they’re less likely to trust smaller interactive firms with their entire campaign. It’s not because social media is “new”. It’s because it’s hard to find a credible agency that knows what the hell they’re doing.

That’s hard to do when an agency doesn’t even leverage social media for their own purposes. These firms get into handling someone else’s social media campaigns and they think that the immediate goal is the almighty dollar - they’re wrong.

Sound like a contradiction to being in business in the first place? It is, but it makes sense here. There are way too many agencies that are overly-anxious to sell because they want to see an ROI that will sell the work they’ve been doing. Results show some measure of proof that their service is needed. It’s not that they want to see results for the client, they’re praying for results to prove the necessity of the work they’re doing.

We really need to be able to monetize social media but too many ad agencies are going on and on about capabilities, product benefits, credentials and services and they’re not leading conversations that deliver solutions and answers. They’re making it so prospective buyers need to click a link and “buy in” to get the solution and that’s not how it works. That’s going to kill the playing field for everyone. As an agent handling a client within social media, you have to provide genuine value in order to gain appeal with prospective buyers.

A massive mistake that many business owners make, and this gets funneled down to marketers, is that they’re always looking at their customers as nothing more than money. Imagine doing business with someone who is constantly thinking that their money is in your pocket and they’re always scheming to figure out how to get it from your pocket to theirs.

It doesn’t matter how you veil your motives, most prospective buyers or clients aren’t that dumb and they’re going to sense it. That only makes business harder; not only for the business owner but for every other individual trying to legitimately engage prospects within social media.

Here’s a thought that you need to pin to the inside cuff of your sleeve, so every time you shake someone’s hand it’s visible to you: “The key to successfully building a brand online is to genuinely care about the people you’re engaging”

Relationships come first. If you haven’t gotten that yet, it’s time to change. Either that, or stop squatting in the middle of the playing field. Other people are tired of stepping in your land mines.

Spread the knowledge ... Re-tweet this content.

Outsource Your Marketing in Minutes to Hundreds Worldwide...
Click Here >>>