The Road to Entrepreneurship...

As early as six months ago, Internet juggernauts such as Jason Calacanis and Leo Laporte have been calling for a mass exodus of Facebook due to the questionable security policies and unethical business practices by it’s founder Mark Zuckerberg. Well it looks like all that talk has finally grown to be something big. May 31st has been designated as ‘Quit Facebook Day’ where, more for protest rather than disruption, some in the tech community are planning a boycott of Zuckerberg’s Internet empire - ironically, a Facebook fan page has been created for this. So far almost 15,000 people have pledged to do so. It is quite a noble and necessary cause that I think could serve as an eye opener to the company. 

I have been a Facebook user since 2004 - when it was only available for .edu accounts but I no longer consider myself a heavy user.  My last login was almost a month ago and I can’t remember when I logged in last before then. For me the initial value of Facebook was to reconnect with friends from high school and college. More recently, I have used it to promote this blog as well as other self-promoting activities. I never saw it as a private extension of my real life social network. For me, everything on it was public anyway and everything I posted on it reflected that. The reason I bring this up is because I am not the typical Facebook user. Deleting my account should not impact the company in any way whatsoever.

So why am I considering deleting my account? The answer is simply that I do not actively use Facebook. Deleting my account would be one less account there that I need to worry about. However, if in doing so, I am part of a cause that will send a message to Zuckerberg and his team over at Facebook that our data should be managed fairly and with great respect, then so be it.

Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Gowalla, Buzz….the list goes on. Social interaction using online media is here to stay. Think about it… it was only a couple of years ago when such social sites were predominantly used by technology early adopters(technorattis). Now it appears that almost all segments along the technology adoption curve have signed onto using such media, yes even the laggards. The point here is that the Internet continues to revolutionize our lifes and social interaction is another example of that. So, I pose the question - how well are you utilzing social media to enhance your social interaction and build relationships?

To help you answer that, think about the following use cases and see how well you apply them.

Enhance your personal network
The common argument against social media is that it does not serve as a good networking tool - compared to traditional networking. Traditional networking, which includes getting introductions and face-to-face meetings can be enhanced through online social media. I value traditional networking - nothing can replace facetime with contacts and the purpose of this post is not to knock it. However at best, a typical networking meeting can only occur twice a month, usually at a coffee shop, for an hour(maybe). This means that you have to learn most of what you want to know about your contact within that time. Of course an alternative method could include communicating via email or over the phone but that usually means you have to ask the “right” questions in order to learn more about your contact.

Adopting social media (and using it well) can enhance this relationship. For instance, by simply “following” or “friending” your contact, you have access to any thoughts, gripes, or announcements that this contact may share. You can now ask better questions and have better conversations when you do meet face to face.

Build your brand - push your agenda
I would first like to give credit to Gary Vaynerchuk, I think he played a significant role in convincing people, myself included, to leverage the power of social media to brand themselves and push their agenda. To piggyback of the previous point, having the ability for create a better quality network of contacts gives you the opportunity to spread your agenda. Regardless of what your interests are, you can begin to build a “following” through your network. For instance, I am very interested in technology and entrepreneurship. I use social media to interact with other liked minded individuals as well as push my agenda - that is entrepreneurship and business development.

Stay current
The final case that I would like bring home is that of using social media as a legitimate news source. Just like social media greatly enhances your personal network, it also improves the quality and frequency of information that comes to you. The real time and unregulated nature of social media sites (as they are today) gives unprecedented access to news that relates directly to you. Sticking with the example of entrepreneurship, “following” individuals who are prominent entrepreneurs known nationally or locally will keep you informed on new entrepreneurial developments as well as failures and catasthropes in different industries.

So given these use cases, I ask again, how (well) do you use social media?