Broadcasting - Raul Colon - photographer, digital marketer & writer living on the beach in Puerto Rico.

Make Noise and they Will Come – Part 2

May 10, 2011 by Raul Colon

Part 2 of Make Noise and they Will Come – Part 1 which I published previously regarding how a politician took a wrong avenue in gaining new possible voters. I wanted to continue the conversation expanding on the effect of it in Social Media.

The previous post aligns with a tweet I saw from the Mayor of my hometown @MayitaEMelendez who uses her account to broadcast instead of engaging with her community. I have written to her via twitter and I have never received a reply. When you look at her less than 50 followers I guess it must be hard for her to reply to all of them. If I take a quick look at who she is following it clearly reveals individuals in the press with the clear message that she is more interested in projecting a message than using a tool to create relationships.

If we look at the Mother’s day tweet she sent on Mother’s Day we can clearly see her interests are to the Mothers of Ponce she really does not care about anyone else who is outside of her hometown and my question is does she genuinely care about the mother’s of Ponce?

[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/MayitaEMelendez/status/67203110375931904″]

I always use @MayorBillFinch from Bridgeport, CT as an example on how politicians use twitter. (Let me also comment that he also has an awesome team behind him like @bambambpt). Look at @MayorBillFinch’s Mother’s Day tweet and compare it to @MayitaEMelendez and I will let you be the judge.

[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/MayorBillFinch/status/67212557299101696″]

Not only does @MayorBillFinch have more followers but he makes sure to get back to everyone either via his account or via his team. A few months ago my brother, who lives in Bridgeport, had an issue during a major blizzard in the city. With just a few tweets sent to the account, the City of Bridgeport took care of his issue.I have chatted via twitter with @MayorBillFinch, who is thousands of miles away, yet the mayor of my Hometown decides to ignore my tweets.

I see how many politicians are missing out on a great opportunity to start building relationships with people like me that would be willing to support a good candidate. Some people have elevated politicians on the Island to royalty. I think tools like twitter can deomonstrate whether or not a politican thinks they are too important to deal with their constituents. Politicians really need to demonstrate that they are not in office for the money; they are there to serve the people.

Everytime I go to my hometown, I see how the streets are torn up and how the few businesses that are there are closing. I want that to change. Maybe @mayitaemelendez should break geographical and political barriers demonstrating she really cares and help her town rise up might make me change my mind about her.

Make Noise and They Will Come

The way that these politicians, car dealerships, Radio Shack, and Vianderos use social media is the same way they use the loud speakers; make enough noise and the clients will engage. They way I handle people seeking that type of attention is by putting them on my ignore list.

On Mother’s day 2011 I unfollowed @mayitaemelendez because I clearly saw how she only cares about herself and probably has an intern managing her account sending generic tweets. Everytime a politician drives near my house making lots of noise I don’t vote for him and ensure that the people around me do the same.

Let’s show those politicians and other business individuals the need to create relationships instead of looking for votes or a hard sell. Find individuals to use as examples like @MayorBillFinch and how they are getting things done. I visit Bridgeport every six months and I always see something in better shape or something new. I visit my hometown once a week and I always see how someone went out of business or how a street has more potholes.

Take the opportunity to use Social Media to get things done quicker and more effectively not as another channel to hypnotize people. Believe me it won’t work!

Editor’s Note: Before editing this post I got some great advice from @chrisbrogan over at the Kitchen Table Companies (Affiliate Link) on how there is a difference in Popularity and being Successful. I think a few of these individuals that can improve what they are doing are playing the popularity contest.

photo credit by A .

Make Noise and they Will Come – Part 1

May 9, 2011 by Raul Colon

I guess noise happens everywhere but here in Puerto Rico we don’t have the laws in place to make it stop. Locally there are a set of vehicles with speakers making noise and broadcasting music or a message. There are many people that use these tactics from various walks of life to get the attention of everyone and here are a few examples.

Car Dealerships – They play loud music to supposedly attract individuals to go in and buy a car. From my perspective I have never gone car shopping gauging who is playing my favorite type of music much less who is playing it the loudest.

Vianderos – In some towns and places there are still individuals who carry produce and other items to your door. They do make enough noise to let you know what items they have and to make you run out of the house so you can stop them.

Radio Shack and other Retail stores – In the strip malls you have Radio Shack playing music or better said making noise along other retail stores with the same mentality of if you make noise they will come.

Politicians – Individuals responsible for most of the noise. I am not familiar with any politician trying to go after a law trying to limit the amount of noise you can do publicly during the day. But on the other side I would say they are the people responsible for making the most noise especially when the elections are getting closer.

This morning I kept on hearing noise with music and I could not define what it was. Eventually it got closer and about 9:20 a.m., I was able to define that the noise was coming from a SUV with speakers. The objective was blasting a message to wish all mothers a happy mother’s day from a guy that I have never heard of before. See the video of the vehicle when it made its third run near our house.

Locally I see many businesses taking the approach of broadcasting such as car dealers talking about a new car that came into the lot. But I see very few of them actually solving issues or answering questions to close the deal on sales. Instead of making sure they have a customer that is interested they just bombard them with information which in most occasions is useless.

It would be great if you could Subscribe to Raúl Colón’s Blog via Email and get the second part of this post which will be published tomorrow and I will tie the Social Media aspect to the above issue.

Photo Credit by patrickwoodward

Community Building vs Growing Your Ego

March 4, 2011 by Raul Colon

Meeting people with Huge Ego’s online is pretty common. What is confusing about some of them is that a few think they are actually building a community when in reality they are working on, is growing their Ego.

I see how many individuals create a world around to benefit themselves. Every effort I try to run I try to benefit those around me. I think of my family, friends, and community first. Every time I will act on something my nature makes me think of how it will benefit those around me first.

My overall online approach in building my community

Two way communication ensures healthy growth of your community. By understanding what your community is expecting from you. When everyone has a clear understanding on what they should expect from you there is less probability of miscommunication on both sides. Always cultivate two way channels they are great for learning and finding solutions.
Be human. Many people become act like robots online with repetitive behavior that might not inspire any interest . Respond in a way without a rigid protocol (there are always exceptions. Don’t forget to have fun when interacting with your community.
Be Helpful without expecting anything in return. I have had the opportunity to create great relationships by just being helpful. When you are truly helpful without expecting anything in return you build trust.
Be Responsive if someone took the time to reach out to you take the time to respond in a genuine way.
Always be Accesible make sure people can get a hold of you either via twitter, facebook, blog, or your telephone. Make sure you make time for the people that are important. If it is a corporate or personal channel it helps that everyone know the best way to reach you.
Identifying people with common interests and reaching out to them will help you in keeping the conversation going. Common interest amongst does that interact also helps in growing your community organically and keeping context in everything that is shared.
Tying your online and offline communities. On many occasions I see people keeping separate communities. I see a lot of value in tying both and making them one.

The Confused Individuals Who Are Only Growing Their EGO

Self-promotion is the biggest flag of people trying to focus on their Ego instead of building relationships. Examples of self-promotion:
- Re-tweeting when people give you a compliment.
- Always saying how great you are.
- If someone they collaborate with has accomplished something they try to grab all or at least most of the credit.
Broadcasting does not open up conversation it only launches information. Other traditional channels broadcast there messages and don’t have a channel to receive feedback. If most of the time you are broadcasting your message this can be detrimental to your efforts to build a solid community. Constant broadcasting can be used to self promote and force a message on a group or individual. Forcing a message and having influence are two different things.
Being destructive when they don’t get what they want. Some individuals decide to take negative actions when the outcome did not play out to their favor. I have seen how individuals who call themselves relationships experts have created toxic campaigns against those that simply un-followed them on twitter, un-friended them on facebook, or just did not agree with them.
Critizicing everyone instead of creating. Some people find it easier to criticize everyone instead of focusing on creating and building upon what they know or what their community is expecting from them. Too much talking and not much action can clearly put yo on track towards swelling your head and acquiring a bigger ego.

Any recommendations on how to build a community in a healthy way?

It would be great if you could share your ideas on how to stay away from growing your Ego instead of building a community?

5 Reasons Why You Should Fear No One & Disconnect!

February 23, 2011 by Raul Colon

When I started using facebook and later on twitter I kept on my bad habit of collecting contacts online. I remember when I used ICQ at the end of the 90’s where I kept on adding people to have more people to chat with but over the years I had grown many contacts. I was able to migrate contacts all the way from ICQ to my contacts on twitter and facebook.

The last few months I have taken a different approach and have been fixing my old and terrible habit of connecting with people which in the long run have very little in common with me.

Analyzing why I have been disconnecting from contacts I have want to share the 5 reasons why I will disconnect, unfollow, or/and unfriend someone:

Spammers are one of the main reasons why I never connect or disconnect with a user via twitter of facebook. Some spammers use tools and they can take too much of your time offering things you have no interest in. There are also spammers that manually are constantly sending the same message to many contacts because They have an offer you can’t refuse.
They’re Offensive and are out to create or stir trouble. Some of them create so much drama and then attempt to become martyrs. These are usually the ones that will also cause more damage when you un-follow them. It is better to detach now than later and if you are still thinking if you want to stay with some attachment to this person ask yourself. Why do We stay near TOXIC People?
Self Centered it is my experience that most of the people that are offensive have also been very self-centered. Using social media should be about creating a balance in sharing your experiences and being generous enough to share the knowledge of others. My friend @chrisbrogan is always sharing and is extremely generous in talking about the accomplishments of his community. Not only does he become a go to person to get info every once in a while he will sell a product or service he fully supports and I have been known to buy it without hesitation.
All they do is broadcast there products, services, accomplishments, and how great they are. Broadcasting equals less Engagement so remember that social networking is about having reciprocity. I usually receive more people engaged in my projects when I put the spotlight on the people that are around me and are great. I try to recognize talents like for example @ricklipsett who is a great digital artist (although he can be a graphic designer also). I admire @michaeldcc’s work on his blog Poder5 for keeping it up and always keeping me posted on what is happening locally. So if you find people that are RT’ing when someone mentions them or are talking about how great they are stealing the glory even from clients just tune them out and remove them from your lists or connections.
Failure to Add Value I mainly use twitter and facebook to share my ideas and content that might be useful to my community. Every once in a while I also add a bit of humor or something to show people I am human also but mainly I try to bring value. Adding value is very difficult to define and I would like to hear about how people add value for you online. If I see someone’s updates are full of hate or with the main purpose to destroy someone else that will get you an automatic un-follow.

When I disconnect online I usually disconnect offline. Some people tend to live dual personalities (1 online and another 1 for offline interactions). So if I disconnected with you online there is a good probably I want no interaction with you offline. There are so many great people with similar interests that i have met online and offline. Why should I waste your time with those that bring no value to your quality of life.

What other reasons or behaviors have you identified to disconnect from people either online or offline?