26 miles and 385 yards
(adapted from an office email I sent on Friday)
From an interview with online wine magnate Gary Vaynerchuk in the copy of .NET magazine sitting on my desk.
On social media:
“The companies that try to understand the return on investment to their social engagement don’t get the picture. I mean, of course, you have to do that, but if you have the best intentions of the brand and the company, you understand that social media is the biggest marathon we’ve ever run. This is a marathon, not a sprint. If you want to build a brand, it’s a marathon. It’s not trackable.”
I’ve been in a few meetings recently where people, both web designers/developers and normal people, were throwing around “Social Media” like it was a bit of script that you drop onto the page and *shazam!* you suddenly have a rich and vibrant community supporting your brand.
It took Gary Vaynerchuk 18 months of daily video blogging wine tastings before he found his audience and his social media strategy took off. And it wasn’t even a strategy. It was him doing what he loved and hoping some other people would love it too.
Something to think about.