Insights

The Problem with Influence

I just read something by a friend that’s both interesting and sad at the same time (and sad as in lame, not as in Bambi).

My friend mentioned that he was speaking to a well-known PR guy and author a few months back.

The topic of the conversation was a site for bloggers and authors that my friend works at. According to the PR guy, the site would never be much of a success because he (the PR guy and author) wasn’t ranked high enough.

The PR guy then went on to say that the site wouldn’t be a success because, “You have to make sure the biggest influencers are ranked at the top.”

As my friend so eloquently put it, well f*ck me sideways.

Influence Shminfluence

The problem with influence is that it all boils down to relevancy. You can’t tell me that a pig farmer in Alaska (tough old pigs out there!) is influenced by what a PR guy is saying about the 2.0 or 3.0 world.

Instead, I’d think he’d be more influenced by bacon writers and pork chefs, and analysts looking at how the pork buy trade will look in the next two years.

When it comes to influence, the folks that matter to us are the ones that are in our industry, or affect the industries of our customers and clients. That’s what influences our business and its success (or lack of it), not someone who’s in an industry that has little to no relevance to us.

There’s no doubting that the PR guy is influential in his sphere – but does that mean he should be viewed as such in all spheres, and “ranked higher” because of it?

Egos and Eggheads

And this is where the real “problem” with influence comes in – when it starts to make you feel you automatically deserve to be in a certain position, or recognized more by something or someone.

The quote my friend uses – “You have to make sure the biggest influencers are ranked at the top” – is possibly the biggest reason why influence is coming under so much flak at the minute (just Google “Klout sucks” to see some examples).

We seem to be creating an environment where people expect to “be someone” because you have some success in a certain field, which is a shame.

There’s nothing wrong with success, and there’s nothing wrong with pride in your achievements. Hell, success should be celebrated.

Ego, on the other hand (especially one where your head gets as big as an egg’s on a pin tack) is a different beast altogether. When it reaches the stage that someone says a venture won’t be successful because the influencers aren’t ranked higher – then we have a problem.

Influence and Success

We need influence. Consumers buy from their favourite celebrities and their recommendations of a product. Professionals buy from people they trust when that person makes a recommendation. Brands use “names” to help promote products and services.

So influence works. But wouldn’t it be better to be the right influence, as opposed to the type that’s defined by someone who appears to have a huge dose of self-importance?

And as for that site that would never be a success?

There are about 30,000 authors and bloggers registered with the site. The company had a great Blog World Expo, and are about to launch a new platform that (ironically) will help people like the critical PR guy connect with bloggers for PR campaigns.

Not too bad for something that defines its own influence, huh?

image: Divine Harvester

Everyone Is Someone’s Child

Sometimes, through anger, we see our own frailties. Or maybe not frailties – but definitely nuances that could be shared better.

The last few days has taught me that, as I’ve been pretty angry on this blog. Although, to be honest, I don’t see it as much anger as it is passion.

I’m passionate about how business should be run; how people should be treated; how ideas should be received. But that passion can sometimes blinker my view, and that can then be mistaken (rightly or wrongly) for anger.

But… passion and anger can tread a very fine line with each other, and that then leads to possibly hurting others. Which goes against everything I believe in to start with.

Today, a couple of posts made me realize that my passion may have overstepped the line and molded into anger instead.

Critic or Caustic

Someone I admire a lot is Jennifer Fong, and she posted her take on my recent post about bloggers not being able to stand the heat. In Jen’s post, she recalls the sage words that if you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say it at all.

While I might not agree with that completely – sometimes we have to say things that won’t be liked – Jen makes a great point about how these things could be said. Part of Jen’s post that stood out to me was this statement:

I think we sometimes forget that whether you?re an A-lister or a D-lister, we?re all still people. People with feelings.

If I’ve written something that resulted in someone like Jen writing something like that, that makes me stop and think on how I’ve portrayed something.

The other post was from Chris Brogan, who responded to some criticism he’s had in the last few days (one of which came from my blogger and heat post). Chris makes some valid points about criticism, and why some matters and some doesn’t. But what stood out for me from Chris’s post was this comment from his wife, Kat:

In the end guys, it’s just a job. We all go home at the end of the day. We hold our kids and/or our partner and smile and relax. It reminds us why we work hard and why it matters.

There’s more to Kat’s comment, but that part stopped me dead. Because I’m a father, and a husband, and it made me remember a simple thing.

Everyone is Someone’s Child

Or father. Or husband. Or wife, or daughter, or son. And sometimes we forget that. When we criticize, we forget that it’s not just the person we’re criticizing, but everyone around them.

Sure, a blogger has their community to rally around them when the shit hits the fan, and that’s great – that’s what a great blog should have. That tells you you’re doing it right.

But behind the scenes, a wife or a little kid is watching their loved one take heat. It may well be justified heat, but how it’s given can mean the difference between, “Oh, another one of your readers complaining – ah well” to actually upsetting the people behind the blogger. And that’s wrong.

So.

Like I say. I’m a passionate person, and I can’t – won’t – change that. It’s how I was brought up, and it’s how I (mostly) am away from here. If I see something – or someone – I disagree with, I’ll continue to offer an opposing view, and the reasons why. Any other approach would be cheating both myself and you.

But how I share my opposition?

I’ll be remembering that everyone is someone’s child. And I’ll be trying not to upset the parent from now on. If I slip up, feel free to be the first to remind me of this post.

Sound fair?

image: paloetic

Don’t Be a Blogger If You Can’t Stand the Heat

“If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.” Harry S. Truman.

It’s been a funny old week in social media. The natives are getting restless and angry. People are questioning more, and accepting less. This is a good thing.

When we accept for too long, we become immune to what’s right, or what could be right. We simply become drones, and wait for the next generic piece of news or advice to be fed to us.

Except we don’t see it as generic because – rightly or wrongly – we’ve elevated the speakers to the position of icons, or representatives.

It’s not too dissimilar to the fixation some people have on celebrities.

We buy magazines that compete for the juiciest story, the meatiest headline, because they know it’ll sell copies. It doesn’t matter if the story is a piece of crud or not – it sells because it fills our need for quick fixes.

Because of this fixation, we place celebrities into multi-million dollar lifestyles where they soon lose touch of who put them there, and complain that magazines are taking photographs and making money from them.

They complain of a loss of privacy, and why can’t people just love what they do.

To some points, they’re right. Just because you’re in the public eye doesn’t mean everything you do should come under scrutiny. But the public face of you? You chose that, and so should be answerable to it.

If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Bloggers are kind of like the Holywood celebrities, or at least the “top-tier bloggers” are. With subscriber numbers in the tens of thousands, social network followers in the six figures and book deals either past or upcoming, the name bloggers are the equivalent of our Hollywood crushes.

They lead the way because they’ve found their audience and written – successfully – for them. Nothing wrong with that at all.

But sometimes they’re questioned. Sometimes their point of view isn’t universally accepted as being the right one, and the comments after a particular post bear this out.

This is when we see if the blogger is an A-Lister and all that means (respect for critics as well as fans) or if they’re A-list only to those that placed them in that position.

Some “pass the test”, if you like. Some don’t, and prefer snark and offering a retort that’s quite clearly a jab at the person asking the question. Again, to each their own – if you want to come back snarky, that’s your choice.

But your response defines how others see you.

I unsubscribed from Chris Brogan’s blog a while back (though I’ll still pop over and read it) after he preferred snark over conversation with a bunch of his commenters. Funnily enough, I found new respect for Brian Clark after previously questioning his approach, after the way he handled himself in a few situations.

They both have enough readers not to care about one single new subscribe or unsubscribe. But that’s not the point.

We can all be snarky and respond with bite. But that can be reserved for the post itself. Duking it out with your readers just comes across wrong.

If you offer an opinion, have the balls to have people disagree and question you. After all, they’re the guys who put you where you are now. The least you could do is respect their opinions.

If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Note 23/11/10 – Chris addresses his criticisms in this post today.

image: Catfunt

Grow Some Balls

We need to grow some balls.

Not all of us – there are some folks that have balls the size of Jupiter and show them every day. But they’re becoming fewer in numbers, and that’s a shame.

A lot of folks blame social media for this. I can see why. If you question someone and they’re a person of “influence”, usually you get a shit-storm of comments about you being a hater. Right, like having an opinion means you hate something…

Or if you call something out as being bunkum, again you can often get a ton of crap landing on your doorstep as people question your brains, your ethics, your sanity and more. And on social media (or the web full stop), it’s easy to hide behind the wall of the virtual burning pitchfork along with the rest of A-lister X or Influencer Y’s minions.

But the thing is, it’s not just social media – it’s society as a whole, and social media is just part of the blame.

In business, “leaders” have forgotten what it really means to lead. Instead, they bully employees into thinking their ideas are dumb, and while the employee is on the ground picking their shredded idea up, make sure they stop and get a coffee on the way back.

Educators are telling our brightest students that they won’t have a voice in the business world when they leave college, so be quiet, just listen to your superiors, and maybe – just maybe – they’ll get on in their chosen profession.

Lovers are putting down the ones they supposedly adore by saying they’ll never amount to much and that mother was right, I should have married the guy or gal from the family with the Porsche in the driveway.

Stop. Please. Stop right now.

This is bullcrap. And we’re allowing ourselves to fall for it.

So what if you don’t have the best idea? At least you have an idea and have the balls to put it on the line. So what if you’re the youngest? Know when Mozart began writing symphonies? FOUR YEARS OLD!

And if your partner really blames you for all their inadequacies, find a new partner.

We’ve allowed ourselves to be led by others because we fear what will happen if we think for ourselves. Actually, scratch that – it’s not the ability to think for ourselves that we’ve lost, but the belief in our thoughts being right and following through on those convictions.

And that’s wrong – you know why? There is no such thing as perfection – everything can be improved. And the “experts” don’t always have the best ideas on how to do so.

So, please. Grow some balls. Question everything. Settle for nothing. Even the most common sense answers can always be enhanced through questions and ideas.

If you already have balls and you’re doing this, you can ignore this post and carry on doing what you’re doing. Although if you have some extra balls to go around, feel free to share with those that need a little help. We all need to stop this malaise, and extra balls might just do the trick.

Sound fair?

image: Rafael Penaloza

9 Points on Why I’m Not a Social Media Expert

Over at Chris Kieff’s blog today, there’s a post on how to evaluate a social media expert in 9 ways.

It offers tips on how to spot if your social media person is an expert or not, and uses the likes of Twitter lists, Google, Klout and Facebook fans to determine your expertise.

I’ve seen Chris write some good stuff before but this post is off in so many ways. I left my take on his post in the comments, and it’s repeated here:

Chris,
For the most part, your stuff is usually good, but you missed the ball game completely on this one.
To your points:
1. Google. I can use blackhat SEO (I don?t) to not only help me own Google, but ruin the reputations of my competitor ?experts? into the bargain. Scratch this one from the list.
2. Twitter followers must be over 2,000. Awesome ? I?ll get Justin Bieber to market my company today ? do you have his number? Or, I?ll get TwitterAdder to get me over the magic number and then I?ll be good to go (once I finish high school, obviously, unless I can get a note from my mum).
3. Twitter Lists. This can be useful, but again, it depends on what you?re being listed for. If I?m on 100+ lists, but 25 are for my Batman comics, then I?m not really going to be much good, am I?
4. Klout score of 30+. There?s so much wrong with basing a reputation on an automated measurement tool that I?ll just leave it at that.
5. Facebook friends of 1000+. Curious ? how do my college friends, ex-lovers that hate me but haven?t removed me from their friends, my baker and the newspaper delivery boy that are part of my Facebook friends make me an expert in social media? Some of my ex-girlfriends would say I?m anything BUT social?
6. LinkedIn network of 500+. Have you worked with each of these 500+? Have you made their business more successful? If you?re only connected with them because you have LinkedIn?s icon on your blog?s sidebar and you?ve never really connected otherwise, then they?re faux connections.
7. Facebook fan page 250+ Likes. I can buy 1,000 fans for $197 from uSocial ? does that make me an expert at social media, or an expert at gaming the system?
8. An active blog with active comments. Don?t disagree too much here, except don?t get caught up in the comments game. Two words ? Seth Godin.
9. Profiles on every other site. Um?. yikes! Where?s the strategy in this? Where?s the benefit? Where?s the time management and being focused on where you need to be? Say you set up on 100 networks, have a basic profile, then are only active on 5. The other 95 are now dead, but anyone stopping by and seeing you haven?t updated since 2009 will then ask, why should I trust this guy with my social media needs?
I can see this comment as coming across as snarky, and to be fair, it probably is. Because I care about things being done right, and sorry, but your advice in this post isn?t.
Just my four cents.

Snarky? Like I say in the comment, probably, but stuff like this really pisses me off and devalues everything good people do. You know, the ones making sense of everything for their clients and bringing them success?

I don’t know. Maybe I’m just getting old and bitter.

image: notsogoodphotography