Reputation: Safeguarding Your Equity in Social Media

I don't like to blog too much about blogging anymore. The focus of this journal is life, not the lens through which I observe it. But I'm still passionately interested in the evolution of this medium, and I do love a lively conversation about it. There's one going on right now at Liz Gumbinner's site, which has become a go-to source for great commentary. I've come to think of Liz's site as a favorite trade journal. Blogher, my advertising network of choice, is another.

The piece is in response to a recent post on Blogher that seemed to suggest it's a blog-eat-blog world out here. I read it when it came out, and as I wrote in Liz's comments, I thought, I must be on some other internet. It hasn't been my experience, nor has it been Liz's. The gap in perception reminded me of the complaining that has become kind of a tradition after each annual Blogher conference. There are always those who have had such a miserable time, you have to wonder if they were at the same event as everyone else.

That horse has been pretty well beaten to death by now, and I won't whip it again here, except to say, above the bottom three tiers of the human needs pyramid, people pretty much get to create their own reality. It kills me to see people entering themselves in a contest in their own minds, and then declaring themselves the biggest losers. Please don't do ever do that to yourself. If you are new to blogging, or to conferences, or really, just about anything, don't set yourself up for a terrible experience with unrealistic expectations and unfair comparisons. Don't exhaust your spirit trying to break into established social media networks. Work on building a new one instead, and don't use the popularity contest as your blueprint. Reach out, not up.

Some sabotage themselves by completely overlooking the social part of social media. As I said in Liz's comments, relationships are what make this world go 'round. Yes, there are some schemers, cutthroats and cheaters. But this is one sphere in which karma is accelerated. I wish we talked about reputation half as much as we discuss brand. Think of traffic and followers as the stock portion of your social media portfolio, and reputation as the bond. A good reputation is not as thrilling as thousands of hits or followers. There's no site meter to track credibility, honesty, kindness, generosity or reliability. And yet those assets are the equity that will sustain you over the long haul. They may not be what advertisers look at (though they should be), but they are what your peers in social media look at when deciding if it is safe to invest in you.

I am the last person in the world qualified to preach on manners. I am absent-minded, frequently pre-occupied, and sometimes just plain thoughtless. Nobody's perfect, and I don't expect perfect behavior from anybody. But in social media, in particular, because there's not much else to go on, good behavior matters. Certain things raise a flag with me. Play the victim much or attack others with your tweets? Flag. Passive-aggressive updates? Flag. Repurpose something I shared with you, and don't mention its provenance? Flag. Quick to take offense where none was intended? Flag. Defensive? Testy? Catty? Flag, flag, flag. (No flags for unfollows/unfriending by the way--everyone gets a pass on that with me. I assume you have your reasons.)

Not one, or even a couple of those kinds of things gets a conviction in my book. But string more than couple together, and they make me go hmm. In the big, little town that is social media, even a small-time blogger like me, with readers in the hundreds, not thousands, can have some influence. Not to break or make a career; no Colbert bumps here. I can't convince anyone, no matter how much may they like me, to create an opportunity for someone where none exists. But sometimes, even a small-time blogger like me can help connect people with an opportunity that does exist. And enough mental flags around a name will keep me from suggesting it. Not out of retribution; but out of vigilance for my own reputation.

It seems like all this would go without saying. I'm sure for most it does. Yet everyday I see people throwing away goodwill, damaging their reputations, and draining their own social equity in ways that their site meter will never reveal to them. Opportunities missed that they'll never know were so close. Maybe the very kind of opportunity they were scrambling toward over somebody else's back, or spewing jealousy about.

And I hate that for them. Because believe it or not, most of us want each other to succeed. If this is a contest, it's a relay race on field day. Plenty of prizes for everyone, and nobody wins on their own.