Open up your mind and say, ahh...

Like us on Facebook.

Follow us on Twitter.

+1 us on Google Plus.

Sound familiar?

It’s an all too familiar request that consumers face everyday. But what are businesses doing to help convince customers why they should do so? The answer is not as pervasive as you might imagine or hope to expect. In fact, I believe that “why?” is the least asked question by businesses in social media today.

The questions businesses should be asking, even before they create a social presence whatsoever include:

Why should we have a presence in Facebook, Twitter, et al.?

Why would consumers connect with us now and stay connected over time?

Consumers will expect businesses to think through these questions carefully and to present the answers and corresponding value into conversations and more important, into ongoing editorial and engagement planning and programming. It’s what makes social media just that…social.

I recently joined NBC’s Scott McGrew, Jon Swartz of USA Today and Dr. Moira Gunn of NPR on press:here to discuss this subject at greater length. Please take a moment to watch and let me know your thoughts for how businesses can use social media to improve customer relationships.

I’ve been thinking through my social presence, but further more, I was thinking about what it’s going to be like for a business (small or large) to manage their social presence. The thing is, there are a lot of different ways people are going at this, and not any one of them is perfect, but I like looking at what is there and then thinking about what else I’d want.

For instance, I’m a user and affiliate for the Hootsuite application. If you look at the graphic to the left, it lets you post messages and read messages from Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, FourSquare and elsewhere. It also lets you cook up searches in Twitter search, plus a few other things. There’s a built in link shortener (though I’d love to be able to swap out my own), which means that I get stats and tracking, too.

But what else would something like Hootsuite have to do for you to make it your standalone dashboard for managing your social presence? Here’s a small list of thoughts:

• • A way to listen beyond Twitter search. I need Google Blogsearch, for instance, so I can have bigger ears. Plug in Radian6 or Sysomos or similar and this would be done (for a fee).
  • A blog editor. (They’ve dabbled with linking Hootsuite to WordPress.com, but this shouldn’t be that hard.
  • Email marketing integration. Would love to have my stats in one place for my Blue Sky Factory account.
  • Site analytics, like Google Analytics.

Social Presence Management Needs

But What Else?

What else would you want with a presence management dashboard? What else do you need it to do for you? And what would move it past managing your own (or business) presence, and into managing relationships?

Kind of fun to think about, eh?

Your blog is not your job (unless it is). Twitter is not your job (unless someone’s paying you to tweet). Facebook isn’t your job.

These are just communications tools. We use them. We use them to make media. We use them to weave marketing, sometimes. We use them to tell stories about your organizations or our wants or whatever it is we’re talking about. Spending hours updating status, spending hours chatting, doing things that take us away from our objectives can sometimes feel easy.

Some ways to stay vigilant:

• Use an egg timer. If you’re going to venture out onto Twitter, time it.
• Keep a sticky note of your objectives in sight of your monitor.
• Ask yourself for every blog post what your goal with that post should be.
• Ensure that you’re doing this all with some goal in mind, and can you measure that goal?
• Tend to your main objectives first, and use the secondary time for social media.

Your mileage will vary. You’ll see results in some of what you do. But if you’re doing it because it’s what you think you’re supposed to do, keep your eye on things. Stay vigilant.

Yesterday, my blog was not my job, so I didn’t write one. Today? I have two speeches over the next few days. That was my job first, and then this post.

We do want to keep our social presence up, and we can’t let our blogging fall too far behind, but to remember your job from time to time is to remind yourself what will yield the most value in your day.