By now you’ve probably got yourself set up on Facebook or Instagram and you’ve been posting for a while, awesome!  Let me take a wild guess and say the leads haven’t started pouring in? This probably has you contemplating, ‘Well should I even be doing social media?’ or maybe you are even thinking, ‘Social media and online marketing simply doesn’t work.’ I’m going to let you in on a little secret. It is an old technique and it is called connecting with the users on the other end of that post.

Scary, right? It is so scary to actually connect with another person, to send them a personal message, to say hey thanks for engaging, following me, and being part of my tribe but I’d be willing to bet if you did this your social media efforts would be more successful. Now, I’m well aware some of you are probably sitting there saying that I don’t have time to do that. I would contend it is essential to your success, in life, in business and in building your brand’s ecosystem.

Connecting with other human beings is an essential part of life, personally or professionally. You need to connect. When you are in business for yourself, it is even more essential. Every single person you meet is a potential prospect, a referral partner, or a business colleague. You simply never know whom you are meeting.

With that said, I get asked questions all the time on how do you do it? How have you built your business on social media? The answer is it hasn’t been built simply on social media. It has been built on me taking the time to send a personal email to someone who has a question, to send a happy birthday wish to someone who I met several years ago, to engage in groups online, to post consistently to my networks, to send facebook or LinkedIn messages to people. I spend time connecting and you should to if you want your marketing to work.

Building an ecosystem for your brand simply isn’t a set it and forget type thing. You can’t just turn facebook on and expect leads to come in. Social media and online marketing in 2015 and for the foreseeable future still needs the human touch. It needs the personal aspect of someone say ‘Hey x, I saw your question about facebook ads and would love to help. Here is what you can do.” It is that one extra step of being personal, real, human, and authentic.

I challenge each of you to step out of your comfort zone and find people to engage and connect with. They are all around you (especially if you’ve been doing social media for a while). Go out and send 10 personal notes and watch the results start coming in.

Don’t forget to let me know how it goes. Leave a comment below.

And if you haven’t already, be sure to get your 2016 Social Media Content Calendar.