The Relationship Ladder - Rung #4 DIALOGUE

You've invested a lot of time in trying to elicit a response. Perhaps the reason that you haven't been successful (yet!) is that you are spread too thin.

This week I made a major decision which was predicated by coming to the realization that I was indeed spread too thin, in a lot of areas of my life, including social media.

For those that know me well, you'll understand that it takes a lot to get me to that point, as multi-tasking is my middle name.

Getting people engaged in dialogue online is getting more and more difficult. Case in point is Groups on Facebook and Linked In. Lots of people join them, perhaps to have that "badge" on their profile so people know what they are interested in, but very few people get engaged to the point where they are actually eliciting dialogue.

Dialogue is first and foremost a function of LISTENING. You can't have a meaningful dialogue if you are the only one talking. That is called monologue for a reason. So the difference between Rung #3 of trying to elicit a response and #4, DIALOGUE is how much listening you are doing versus talking.

Is your response one that is just intended to turn the attention back to you? Or do you really care about the other person's views and their needs?

One of the characteristics of true online dialogue is when it has more than a single cycle (e.g. a comment that may have a response, but no more interaction) or when someone else chimes in, having found value in your contribution.

To get to multiple cycles, well, that is Rung #5 - Conversation. Stay tuned!

Chicke Fitzgerald | co-founder | Word of Mouth Media

The Relationship Ladder - Rung #3 RESPONSE

You fully understand that rung #1 of the ladder is spamming and you've gotten past rung #2, noise.

You get it -- that in order to really make a dent in the social grid, you have to get folks engaged. You need to get a response -- to get noticed.

Quite often, the first step is following the big boys, the leaders of the social media pack.

You read their blogs, you comment, you try to get noticed for your clever observations. You join Digg, Disqus, Reddit, Newsvine and others and post your comments and even check that you want to "follow the dialogue". But the transom is silent.

You "retweet" their posts on Twitter. You shift your strategy to retweeting the posts of people that you know and follow.

You comment on their YouTube videos and even venture out into doing video comments.

Perhaps you are bold enough to launch your own blog or post articles on eZine.com. You even add a Google FriendFeed to your blog to give the hordes a way to signal their response.

While you are pursuing relationship and engagement, which is better than noise,
at this juncture, what you are still doing says loud and clear, "Listen to me! I matter!". It simply isn't enough to just talk or to hope that you can elicit a response.

Getting past the response stage takes time and energy. Getting to dialogue isn't easy, but the good news is that it is possible.

Stay tuned. We're going there next.

Chicke Fitzgerald | co-founder | Word of Mouth Media

The Relationship Ladder - Rung #2 NOISE

OK, so now you understand that even though spamming is something you can do quickly and really quite effortlessly, it is not a wise move in social media by anyone's measure.

The next step up on the ladder is NOISE.

No one likes to be called "noisy", yet, this is typically the first step for someone who decides to "graduate" from email spamming or the social media equivalent of mindless autoresponders trying to "sell" your idea or product to whoever follows you on social media.

Noise in Word of Mouth Media™ is the equivalent of going to a party and walking from group to group, introducing yourself and spouting off whatever you want to say and walking away without even knowing whether anyone cared or wanted to learn more.

Engagement does NOT follow noise, nor does conversion.

One of my favorite authors is Sam Horn. She wrote a great book called POP! with the sub-title of stand out in any crowd. Trust me, it doesn't include instructions for how to generate "noise". What Sam does talk about is how to get from the place where someone "furrows their brow", which translates into not being very happy about whatever just happened, or worse, no "brow reaction", to the place where you get a positive response (or in social media terms, someone commenting on your post, your tweet or your video) that looks more like raised eyebrows, which signifies visually "Wow!" or "I get it!".

We'll talk more about engagement when we talk about Rung #3 - RESPONSE. Stay tuned!

Chicke Fitzgerald | co-founder | Word of Mouth Media

The Relationship Ladder - Rung #1 SPAM

Today's post is thanks to Travel Social Media's blog by Chicke Fitzgerald

Of all of the things that I've learned in my 6 month immersion into social media, this one is the most important. It is so important, that I'm going to break it into a series of posts, each one addressing the various rungs of the relationship ladder.

RUNG #1 - SPAM
Without any training or strategy, most everyone that wants to get across a point, get people to an event, or to somehow get them into your sales funnel, begin online at the bottom rung of the Word of Mouth media™ relationship ladder.

SPAM is not just a brand of canned mystery meat, it is what happens when you attempt to have some sort of dialogue or conversation (or what you think might appear to someone as such) without any form of current relationship.

I say current, because most of us have been building our email list (aka address book) for more than a decade. We have everyone from friends and family, to business colleagues, clients, former clients, all the way down to the guy you sat next to on an airplane in 2002, but can't even remember why you thought he was important enough to add to your address book.

We've all done it. You are in a hurry, so you send out a notice of a product launch, an event, a company announcement or even a particularly funny joke, but what you forget to do is to ensure that the person on the other end will actually (a) remember you; (b) care about what you want them to care about.

It goes without saying that this is not only not a good idea, but it is actually counterproductive on a number of fronts.

1. You stand to alienate people that you actually care about a great deal (either personally or professionally).
2. You don't give them a graceful way to tell you that they don't care or more likely, don't have the time for whatever you want them to care about
3. You don't sway them to your way of thinking (they hit delete or navigate away from your post, or worse, unfriend you electronically) before they figure out what it is you really want
   

So, if you are on this rung, STOP | THINK | DON'T SPAM. Stay tuned for Rung #2.

Get Plugged In!