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Why you can't phone it (social networking) in

I provide consulting advice to clients on social media and social networking.

Many have asked me to quote a fixed fee for a fixed set of deliverables. You know what I mean: $NNN per month for X tweets per week, Y Facebook posts per week, Z blog entries per week, and so on.

I say no to them. And if you ask me, I'll say no to you.

Plenty of my competitors say yes. But I don't think this is a solid blueprint for social networking.

Just think about it...

I probably have no way of knowing whether the person who just "Liked" your Facebook page post is the prospect you've been courting for a decade. But you would know.

I probably have no way of knowing whether the nice retweet of your recent tweet was from a valued supplier. But you would know.

I probably have no way of knowing whether that LinkedIn connection invitation came from a complete stranger. But you would know.

And so, in all these cases, I don't know how to respond appropriately. But you would know.

If you're thinking, "Yeah, but... I don't have time to attend to my social media properties," you probably need to ask yourself why you have them in the first place.

And you ought to read this morning's blog entry from Seth Godin ("Do you have a people strategy?"). It smacked me on the forehead with the palm of my own hand. Money quote:

All of these media are conduits, they are tools that human beings use to waste time or communicate or calculate or engage or learn. Behind each of the tools is a person. Do you have a story to tell that person? An engagement or a benefit to offer them? [...] Figure out the people part and the technology gets a whole lot simpler.