Earlier this week I did a presentation in a more rural area of my home state related to social media.
The presentation has been done in a few other areas of the state and I felt the crowd while maybe not wholly engaged was at least somewhat listening and understanding what was being said. That wasn’t the case in this audience of rural area dwellers.
When asking the questions about how many have MySpace or Facebook or otherwise engage in the world of social media, the hands up were fewer than expected.
The blank eyes gazing back at me when I talked about applying social media strategically in both a research and business procedure manner was shocking.
I guess what I’m trying to get at here is that we mustn’t forget that while Social Media may be old hat to geeks like me, not everyone understands it and despite the millions of Facebook users there are millions more who do not update their status and live and breathe mobile technology that keeps them connected with their social network.
Lesson learned: never anticipate that your audience knows what you are talking about and always be ready to adjust your presentations to get them to a comfortable level that allows them to get something for their time, effort and money.
Constance Ard September 25, 2009
