- We Help Equine Businesses
Andres Prado
Andres Prado - Chile
Where is this headed? Mobile phones that connect to the Internet are beginning to show us new possibilities. Allow me to set the stage.
Many of us don’t particularly like shopping. We may get pleasure from buying what we want and need, but the processes of investigating our alternatives leaves many feeling inadequate. For example, I would not consider buying clothes without my wife giving me her opinion, since she sees what I wear much more than I do (I’ve never been one to spend much time worrying about what I wear). I ask my more technical friends for advice when computer shopping and I don’t know how I would buy a new stereo system without asking my brother Rick for his input. He’s an audio engineer and hears the subtleties of sound better than anyone I know. Believe it or not, because of his advice my sound system is simpler, not more expensive. He taught me sound systems should make music sound real, not impressive. So what does this have to do with Social Media?
The panel talked about a time in the not too distant future when we will be able to take our community with us when we go shopping or need to make a decision. Mobile computing can allow you to ask the right people in your community for input when you need to make any decision that might benefit from the insight of your trusted advisers. Does this mean we will lose or surrender our ability to make individual decisions? Quite the contrary. This will just give us the benefit of insight from those we know who have a particular speciality or interest in something we know little about.
Oddly enough, as smart as the folks on the panel were, and believe me they were all pretty brilliant on this subject, the most actionable idea of the evening for small/medium business owners came from someone in the audience posing a question to the panel. He pointed out the necessity of securing your “fan page” on Facebook. This allows customers to “become fans” of your business and interact with you and each other in discussions about your business, your products and your services. The panel provided lots of stories about businesses large and small that have done this effectively. So far, we’ve just secured our page. As we have more experience using these tools, we’ll be glad to share them in this blog.
Where is this headed? Mobile phones that connect to the Internet are beginning to show us new possibilities. Allow me to set the stage.
Many of us don’t particularly like shopping. We may get pleasure from buying what we want and need, but the processes of investigating our alternatives leaves many feeling inadequate. For example, I would not consider buying clothes without my wife giving me her opinion, since she sees what I wear much more than I do (I’ve never been one to spend much time worrying about what I wear). I ask my more technical friends for advice when computer shopping and I don’t know how I would buy a new stereo system without asking my brother Rick for his input. He’s an audio engineer and hears the subtleties of sound better than anyone I know. Believe it or not, because of his advice my sound system is simpler, not more expensive. He taught me sound systems should make music sound real, not impressive. So what does this have to do with Social Media?
The panel talked about a time in the not too distant future when we will be able to take our community with us when we go shopping or need to make a decision. Mobile computing can allow you to ask the right people in your community for input when you need to make any decision that might benefit from the insight of your trusted advisers. Does this mean we will lose or surrender our ability to make individual decisions? Quite the contrary. This will just give us the benefit of insight from those we know who have a particular speciality or interest in something we know little about.
Oddly enough, as smart as the folks on the panel were, and believe me they were all pretty brilliant on this subject, the most actionable idea of the evening for small/medium business owners came from someone in the audience posing a question to the panel. He pointed out the necessity of securing your “fan page” on Facebook. This allows customers to “become fans” of your business and interact with you and each other in discussions about your business, your products and your services. The panel provided lots of stories about businesses large and small that have done this effectively. So far, we’ve just secured our page. As we have more experience using these tools, we’ll be glad to share them in this blog.
