Go where the conversation is, even if you don’t want to be there.
I’m not a huge fan of Facebook. I don’t feel like I get a lot of value out of it anymore, personally. And I’ve long grown tired of the oversharing, the misinformation, and the random arguments that tend to break out seemingly out of nowhere. At this point, anything I post to the platform is really just something that I “shared” via Instagram.
Because of this, I’ve considered — more than once — deleting my Facebook account altogether. I’ve logged in, hit that little arrow by my name, navigated to Settings, clicked on Security, selected Deactivate My Account, only to hit the cancel button.
Why? I’ll tell you.
While I don’t personally enjoy the service a whole lot these days, Facebook represents a signifant piece of the overall social landscape. I recognize how important it is, and that others do find value in it. As someone that leads a digitally-focused advertising agency, there is real value in having hands-on experience with the services I know my clients are going to ask about. There’s value in understanding how they work, trends related to their particular types of micro-content, and the ways in which their users interact with the platform. There’s value in being a practitioner rather than a bystander.
And that’s exactly what I want to talk about. Being a practitioner.
I’ve met more than a few agency people that take great pride in having never used Twitter. Or having never used Snapchat. Or [insert name here]. When I hear those comments, I can’t help but cringe. How can one provide any level of account leadership or strategic insight into how their clients should interact with consumers in 2015, if they aren’t fully immersed in all the platforms available to them (or their clients for that matter)?
I think far too many of us are content to read about how things work, and repeat what we’ve read, rather than having our own real hands-on experience. That’s a mistake. Researching and reading the opinions of others comes with its own inherent benefits, but it shouldn’t stop there.
It’s one thing to read — doing is an entirely different matter. And it’s in doing that we find our own perspectives, our own insights, and our own unique opinions on the world we live in.
It’s impossible to lead, if you don’t know where to go. And it’s impossible to know where to go, if you’ve never been there.
My challenge to you: find a popular app you haven’t downloaded, or a leading social network you haven’t used, and try it out. Spend a solid couple of weeks really immersing yourself in it, and using it the way its biggest fans do. My sense is, not only will you learn a great deal about it in the process, but you’ll form your own unique opinions on it, and its potential value.
And the next time someone asks you about it, you’ll have a meaningful response at the ready.
