The Number One Reason Why Social Media Campaigns Fail

March 18th, 2010 by Easton Ellsworth

Let it go
Surrender
Dislocate

Here’s the biggest reason why social media marketing efforts and other new media campaigns fail.

They don’t let go.

They’re too afraid of that horrible blog post.

They try too hard to steer the conversation their way.

Falling Asleep at the Wheel: When Social Media and Blog Campaigns Forget to Forget Themselves

August 29, 2005.

Where were you on that day – the day Hurricane Katrina blew through The Big Easy?

In late 2006, I had the opportunity to be part of a team that started a well-meaning but ill-fated blog called New Orleans Truth. Its purpose was to help spread the word about post-Katrina rebuilding and recovery efforts in the Gulf Coast areas it affected.

But we didn’t do our due diligence before launching. We assumed that the local blogging community in the New Orleans area would welcome our out-of-town reporting with open arms.

Instead, they took our launch like a slap in the face.

We should have reached out to those in who were already leading that online conversation and who badly wanted to feel listened to instead of shouted over. Instead, we came across as The Disaster Profiteering Krewe.

But we forgot to forget ourselves first, and as a result, promoting our new venture rapidly become a losing battle.

If only we had approached a few leading bloggers in that niche first and said, “Hi – we’re a for-profit publisher looking to do a non-profit, fundraising, awareness-raising blog about this tough situation you’ve been living and blogging about already – would you like to work together?”

Lesson painfully learned:

You fail on the road if you fall asleep at the wheel.

Likewise, you fail in your marketing if you lose focus – if your gaze falls from your goals and the people who you hope will take you there.

Why Letting Go and Surrendering is the Fastest Course to Blogging and Social Media Success

And so fade away
So let it go
And so fade, fade, fade away

So let it go.

Have you ever tried to overcome a serious addiction?

It takes an amazing amount of sheer willpower. It also takes an amazing amount of sheer self-denial – of letting go.

Finding success in social media marketing is the same. Your campaign will succeed only to the degree that you remember that it’s not your campaign. It never was. It can’t be, unless you really want to shortchange yourself and your organization.

Where is your campaign? Where is your community?

If you think it’s headquartered at your Facebook page, your blog or your website, or anybody’s else’s URL, you’re wrong.

Takeaway Lesson: Surrender Your Social Media Campaign and Make It Theirs

I’m wide awake
Wide awake
I’m not sleeping

Is your new media campaign wide awake?

Could it be time for a revival?

Are you obeying the law of the harvest?

Don’t tell people what to do all the time. Instead, “make them want to do it in such a way that it feels like the idea was their own” (Dan Zarrella).

Surrender control of your campaign’s course and you’ll gain far more momentum.

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lyrics: Bad by U2; images: her wings