Do you walk to school or bring your lunch? That was one of my high school teacher’s favorite retorts when people made incoherent arguments and unfortunately, illustrates an issue that keeps coming up in social media and other areas of business strategy- one thing often has nothing to do with the other.
I recently saw a very retweeted article headline stating “Google+ Has Mark Zuckerberg’s Attention, Shouldn’t It Have Yours?” Now, while Heidi Cohen’s article was actually very good and the headline was just a teaser, it did concern me because the general sentiment—i.e. that if Mark Zuckerberg or Liz Strauss or Chris Brogan are doing something, it should be relevant to you— leads far too many business owners astray.
Google+ has Mark Zuckerberg’s attention because it is his direct competitor. If you are an investor in Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or other similar platforms, then yes, you should be up to speed on everything Google+. But if you aren’t, then why Mark Zuckerberg cares about Google+ is totally irrelevant to you.
That’s not to say that it isn’t a good investment of your time, but I don’t know, because I don’t know your business and your objectives. It may make all of the sense in the world or it may be a huge opportunity cost for you.
I don’t mind when folks talk about the features of new tool, or the benefits and issues of a new strategy. Information is powerful and that information should help you to decide whether it works for your own circumstances and business goals. But just because some media darlings are jumping on a hot bandwagon doesn’t mean that you should too. Their circumstances and businesses are different from yours, so do it because it makes sense for you, not because of peer pressure or media darling envy.
