Be successful in Social Media by doing your own thing.

There are a whole lot of online strategy guides for social media but in the end, the real trick to being social with modern technology is to simply forget that it’s modern technology and instead focus on being social by doing what you do best.

Heidi Cohen has a wonderful piece about the 5 Stages of Social Media in which she breaks down the phases that a business goes through for social media, and presents a structured approach to businesses growing their social structure.  I think she’s right about almost everything she says but at the same time, I think it’s vital for business owners (and marketers) to take a step back from well executed social media strategies and remember what it’s really about … being social.

Here are my 5 rules for social media, let me know if you agree or disagree.

Be remarkable.

I love that word, remarkable. I use it on the new Rodonic website all the time, because it doesn’t mean the same as great or impressive, it means to be worthy of remark. I learned that reading one of Seth Godin‘s books.

Be interesting.

Colleen Kitts is a writer in Fredericton who spends too much of her time correcting my grammar and spelling. She reminded me this week that being interesting is important as a blogger, but also on social media. That’s why I’m a fan of George Takei.

Be positive.

Positive is another funny word, we tend to think of it as meaning uplifting or cheery, but it actually means to be clear and without doubt, being positive about something is to be clear about it and have faith in what your saying, which would make anybody pleased.

Be honest.

The internet has a very, very long memory. If you’re going to take the time to post something, make sure it’s the truth and on those rare occasions when you’re wrong, be sure to correct yourself before somebody else does.

Be yourself.

I can’t stress this one enough, be yourself.