The Fourth Excuse for Not Using the Power of Social Media

For all you non-geeks, the fourth excuse I wrote about for a FastGush.com guest post on not harnessing the power of social media is:

4. I'm not a techie

Hey, I'm not a techie either. But I have an open mind to learning new things, and I just plug away until I succeed or ask someone for help.

Let's face it – there is usually a learning curve for almost anything worth doing.

Do you remember the first time you tried using a computer for word processing? After a couple of days of looking at a cheat sheet for how to copy and paste, save, etc., you probably could do it on autopilot.

Now I'm not promising you autopilot for social media, because some aspects of social media sites change often. (Facebook, I'm talking about you.)

And also your own business (products and services) may change over time, requiring changes in your online marketing plan, which may mean learning new social media techniques.

I am promising that, if you have an open mind to learning new things, you can "catch on" to effectively using social media without being a techie.

In fact, social media is not really technical at all. We're not talking about programming and we're not talking about messing up your website because you tried to add just one new photo.

We're talking about starting slowly, even just on one top social media site, observing what others are doing, reading blog posts or books on best practices, and following the best suggestions.

Of course, it can sometimes be difficult to discern what the best practices are. For example, you might mistakenly believe that it is NOT a good idea to send a unique personal message with each Facebook friend request you send. In actuality, it is a very good idea to do this.

And here is one very good thing about social media as opposed to websites that you can't make changes on yourself:

You can easily revise and refine your social media profiles as often as you want. For example, you can change your Twitter 160-character profile bio whenever you feel you have something better to say. Therefore you don't have to wait until you have the "perfect" Twitter bio before starting to participate on that social media site.

(For a free report on setting up an effective Twitter profile see www.MillerMosaicPowerof3.com)

If you are still concerned about trying new things and looking "stupid," get the book MINDSET: THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY OF SUCCESS by Carol Dweck. It's a quick read and it may be just the thing to give you the courage to jump into this brave new world.

And if you jump in with an open mind to learning new things, you may be surprised how soon you experience the aha! moment. That's the moment when you grasp the power of social media to help your business get in front of your target customers and clients.

(You can read all 8 excuses now on FastGush.com.)

Plus read the blog post about the first excuse: "I don't have time to do social media"

The post about the second excuse: "I have nothing to say on social media"

The post about the third excuse: "People in my target market aren't on social media"

© 2011 Miller Mosaic LLC

Phyllis Zimbler Miller (@ZimblerMiller on Twitter) is the co-founder of the social media marketing company Miller Mosaic LLC.

Get the free information "8 Social Media Marketing Mistakes" and "Social Media Marketing Does Not Magically Work; You Have to Work It" at www.facebook.com/millermosaicsocialmedia