I love the web. I’ve been doing business on it for as long as there has been an internet! (Well, maybe not exactly, but close enough. Purists tell me that the web has been around since the late 70s so maybe not). In some ways I’m an early adopter: I get excited about new technology or new marketing channels or new opportunities to show my stuff online. But take note, I said: "In some ways I’m an early adopter". I admit that I’m not always.

In working with other entrepreneurs, I always hear the buzz for the latest and greatest trend. In fact, it wasn’t that long ago that I heard the blog buzz. "Oh, you HAVE to have a blog". Everyone had a blog. Businesses had blogs. People were writing about blogs. It was all about blogs.

Recently, it was all about Facebook. "You HAVE to have a Facebook page". Everyone was figuring out how they could incorporate Facebook into their business. People were writing about Facebook. It was all about Facebook.

Today, it’s Twitter. "You HAVE to be on Twitter". etc.

Well, I agree. To a point. Blogs are good, and can be helpful for business, as can a Facebook page and Twitter. I’m an early adopter and I get excited about these new opportunities as they appear. But I’m only an early adopter to the point where I believe it will benefit my business.

I got a blog early because its value to my business was clear. I took a little longer to get onto Facebook — it was much farther along in its ascension in the public’s eye — because I needed to first identify the value to my business. Only then did I get excited about it and fully on board.

These are exciting opportunities but they can also suck so much time from our lives. If I signed up to every social media site that I was invited to, I’d never get any work done. So instead, here is what I advise people to do:

First, find the sites that are right for your business. For example, consider the business-specific social networking sites of LinkedIn, Xing, and Plaxo. They all have their benefits and drawbacks. Figure out which of them are right for your business and pursue one. (Or, if you only sell B2B, consider doing all three but ignoring the Facebooks and Myspaces and Bebos of the world which could be more appropriate for a B2C business).

Second, determine your intended outcome from that site. Some sites might be appropriate to position you as an expert. Others might be a great way to build up a community of people who are all talking about your topic. Other sites might drive traffic to your site. Or they might offer combinations of these outcomes. You need to figure out what outcomes you desire from each site you’re on.

Third, figure out what you need to do to achieve those outcomes. Then act.

A great example to use is LinkedIn. It’s a good site for a couple of different purposes. One person might want to position themselves as an authority on a topic so they will use the LinkedIn Questions feature and aggressively answer questions posed by the LinkedIn users. Another person might want to use LinkedIn to generate leads, so they would ignore the questions feature and instead work through their list of connections to find who could be a potential client.

This thought process needs to take place for every site you participate in. And as popular as they might be, it is the right decision to drop any site that is not right for your business and comes with a measurable outcome that you can work towards.

Like all marketing, web marketing needs to be approached with plenty of thought and then intentional action. Just because it’s a free medium (unlike television or radio marketing, for example) doesn’t mean that every new opportunity is the right one to choose.

Sorry, ecademy.com, I won’t be signing up.

Contemporary VA

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Have you ever had an experience in life where four or five or ten completely different people (or situations or television shows or website or songs or whatever) are all weirdly congruent and seemingly trying to tell you something? It’s as if everyone and everything else in your life has gathered together when you weren’t there and conspired to send you a message. Maybe it’s me, but I hope it’s not.

Anyway, this is exactly what is going on in my life right now. I’m being reminded of one of those many truths of business that I know but have not been as intentionally practicing: the art of building a community of people.

A friend of mine recently read Keith Ferrazzi’s book "Never Eat Alone" (which I’ve read and it’s sitting on my shelf). I had, but had forgotten about it. Then someone else leant me a copy of Jeffrey Gitomer’s "Little Black Book of Connections". I read it twice and made copious notes. It’s all stuff I know but don’t think about or practice… and really should be.

I have a Facebook page and have connected with some good friends there. But that’s it. And I have a LinkedIn page but haven’t tapped into the large community of people I know there.

Just yesterday I had a project for a customer that required me to research various social media channels and summarize them.

Recently, I’ve been trying to extend a particular service into a particular market. Out of the blue I got a call from someone last week who knows what I do and who offered me a way to connect with that market. I didn’t ask for it and I wouldn’t have got it without knowing this person.

And there’s more: I was on two phone calls today. In the first call, which is sort of a weekly business goals call I have with a colleague, we talked about the importance of community in creating and building a brand. I hung up from him, dialed into another meeting, and had a conversation with someone else that matched almost word-for-word the first conversation. It wasn’t the purpose of my second call but that’s where the conversation went.

And then here is what gave me pause and made me think about all these "coincidences" in my life. On that second call I was expressing to my colleague that I was trying to track down someone who could do help me with a business challenge I have been facing for a few months. After that call she emailed me with an introduction to someone who could exactly solve that problem.

It seems like all of these people and situations in my life have conspired to tell me to put into practice to a greater extent the truth that I’ve already known:

Build a community. Help people selflessly. Share your thoughts and challenges and successes with your contacts. This is one of the advantages that social media and web 2.0 offers us at a broad level that previous iterations of business tried to do on a limited basis.

Okay universe, I’m listening.

Contemporary VA

@ContemporaryVA on Twitter.  Follow us to stay updated with our many resources that include business, accounting and bookkeeping, social media, and much more!