Blind Social Media Sharing, The Devil, and Integrity

In the Details.

So I’m reading over at Mashable about the notion that perhaps sharing in social media is too easy. Not the type of article it thought it was going to be.

I thought it was going to claim that social media was too easy not to do, so people end up sharing their own things – and their own things turn out to be craptastic.

It was actually about a study that examined how people we trust to suggest resources to us sometimes abuse that trust by sharing things they have not reviewed.

The Old School Sharing Style

As I said in the comments, I’m old school. I’m a speed reader and speed typist – and Dragon Naturally Speaking abuser when I can’t type.

So I spend the morning reading more in two hours than most people will read all week.

Because of that, you can be 99 percent sure that I have read every single item I pass along. (1 percent of the time I may do a favor for a friend who has earned a retweet or Facebook share from me after 3 months or so of consistently above average content that I trust. I’ll still read it before I share it further than that.)

Blind Shares – the New Norm in Social Media

Apparently though, this is not the norm. To make matters worse, my shares mimic the style of what the author calls “plain link tweeting” – a headline and link with no commentary. I’ll often rewrite the headline AS commentary to save space, because I talk too much.

I’m a long-winded person. Commentary for me is several paragraphs, not the two sentence limit Twitter has if you’re leaving room for additional retweets. However, this is the reason I do so much research – to learn these tiny tidbits that allow me to make changes that count.

But enough about me.

What the article made me think of is how to look at what David Spark [Twitter] said as clues for how to make a tweet travel a longer distance.’

How This Teaches Us To Get More Retweets

The first item referenced in the study referenced in the article (can’t find a direct link to the study)  is that the average person doesn’t get away with blind links or plain link tweeting – even the so-called influencer only gets away with it “sometimes”.

So rule number one, don’t send blind links.

Add commentary that shows you have read/listened to/watched what you’re passing along. I like to reference specifics like, 1 minute in, or in the third paragraph, or quoting the material.

This is an integrity move. Not just in terms of strongly aligning to the accepted definition of ethical. In terms of being whole and consistent. When your shares have integrity, they are more powerful.

Rule number two, remember that other people send blind links, because supposedly (again, haven’t read the study for myself, but it aligns with my own study and instincts):

• They trust the source of the content.
• They like the title of the content.
• They want to help a friend promote something.

Why do we care about that?

Because you can achieve only popularity just by collecting a bunch of random people with a loose association of interests. You achieve true influence by building a network of active friends who are strongly aligned to similar interests.

Part of the reason people are subscribing to your stream is because they believe you share interests. When opting in, not only will they stay when you prove you can be trusted, they’ll tell other people about you and your content. All the better if they are friends. Then, on rare occasions of the most dire need, you can ask a friend to retweet.

Where do the blind links come in? If most people are sending out content without prescreening, but realize that they can come to trust that you are, it may increase their trust in your content, which will help build loyalty to you as a trusted source.

Rule number three, the Devil is in the Details.

I’m not a fan of the Devil or his work. I do, however, have some respect, reverence even, for systems that get the job done, even if I dislike them on moral grounds.

The idea that the devil in the details stays at the front of my mind because it reminds me to pay attention to things other people may not see. No one else shares your unique perspective on the world, whether that comes from your experiences, your ideas, your expertise or your interests. Especially because I tend to be a big picture kind of person, I deliberately take time out to refine the most impactful details of what I do.

For example, as you see above, headlines matter – one of the reason people blind tweet is because they love the title of something.

When I’m going to write an article or retweet something, I may change the title three times before I’m comfortable proceeding. Sometimes I make a hit, sometimes its only mildly interesting, but every time it’s a better headline than the first one I came up with.

There are other little details that matter – using the right hashtag, sharing targeted content, learning how to find the best stuff, first.

We just referenced the fact that one of the reasons for sending blind links is that people trust your content. Trust builds loyalty.

Pop Influence Kills It All

Here’s the problem with this formula – and it is HUGE.

You can do all these little things right and still fall flat on your face, if you’re relying on the accepted social media definition of popularity. If you build a network based on how big it can get, you’re really building a popularity matrix, not an sphere of influence. Why should you care?

Because if you’re passing along content that people aren’t actually viewing, because they don’t actually care, only the minority of people who touch it will engage with you. And that’s the whole point of the exercise, to connect to people you can help, because people who your business can help are the ones who will click, subscribe and buy.

So you want to be  influential. Though I have grown to hate what that term has been bastardized to represent, real influence actually matters. So I go beyond it and say, you can become powerful.

But is power attainable? Is influence a skill that can be learned or a talent? If influence can be faked online, does it truly matter?

We’ve got to ask these questions, rather than following the trends blindly.