The World According to Mitch Fanning

Earlier this week, I had the pleasure of listening to Jonathan Lister, Managing Director of the Canadian and Latin American division of LinkedIn deliver a keynote to a crowded room of business people over breakfast at the Toronto Board of Trade.

When it comes to using social media for business, Jonathan emphasized the importance of understanding the social platforms available, having a plan (and policy) for each, and being selective when it comes to building your professional network.

Understand the Social Platforms

By understanding what’s available, Jonathan claimed, individuals can make better decisions as to why and how they should get involved.  He demonstrated this point by outlining how he personally uses each major social network.  For instance, Jonathan uses Linkedin for his professional contacts (obviously), Facebook for personal use, and Twitter for a bit of both (but mostly for business).

My approach is very similar.

In fact, I’ve recently clarified my “qualifying process” used to decide who I connect  with online.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not anti-social.  I’m simply choosing to use social media to strengthen my relationship with the people I care about most (friends, family, colleagues, clients, partners).  The people who have “relevance” in my life.

Have a Personal Brand Policy

My other “take-away” from Jonathan’s talk was the need for a personal brand policy for each social network I participate in.  Simply put, you need to answer the questions: “Why am I here?” and “why should someone listen/connect/follow me?”

Knowing the answers to these questions does 3 important things:

1. It helps you qualify the value of your connections (i.e. friend, fan, follower, professional)
2. It helps you create and curate relevant content for each network (i.e. personal or business)
3. It helps you publicly communicate your policy so others can then decide whether or not they want to connect with you (i.e. are you relevant to their world)

Here are examples using my personal social media policies:

Facebook Policy: Moving forward, my Facebook profile will only be for close friends and family, with the exception of and a few professional colleagues and/or groups who I highly respect and trust.  I’m also thinking about starting a Facebook Page for just business content as some of my professional contacts prefer using Facebook over the other social platforms.  Regardless, when it comes to my Facebook connections, the question I now ask myself  is:  “Hypothetically, if I saw this person out at the mall, would either of us make an effort to stop and say hello?” If yes, I’ll connect.  If no, they don’t make the cut.

Twitter Policy: For the most part, my policy for Twitter won’t really change much.  My objective with Twitter has always been to provide good business content and brand myself as a “go-to” person when it comes to building business using the web (i.e. interactive strategy, blogging, search marketing, social media optimization, email marketing).

Linkedin Policy: Linkedin has always been about professional connections.  However, after listening to Jonathan, I’ve made a decision to improve the “quality” and “relevance” of my 1st connections. Why is this important? Listen to Jonathan’s explanation here (audio clip: approx. 2 min) to find out.  Alternatively, watch this short video.

If you want to gauge how strong your “1st degree” network is on Linkedin, try this litmus test:  Make a request to ten “1st degree connections” and ask to be introduced to someone they know (a “2nd degree connection” to you).  If your success rate is not over 80% consider eliminating the 20% who did not respond after an acceptable amount of time.  The lesson: be selective and make sure your connections are relevant.

Stop Talking. Start Connecting

Once you understand why you use a particular social network, establish your policies, and become selective about who you connect with, the value of your online network will increase and your efforts will pay off.

About the Author

Mitch Fanning is VP of Strategy & Business Development for Fruition Interactive (Toronto, Canada). He’s spent 11 years working with businesses of all sizes, from global brands to some of Canada’s fastest growing web start-ups ranked in the PROFIT 100.