Everyone is saying that we need to be authentic. But how do we do that?

There are so many buzzwords in social media and marketing today. From ROI and CTR through to sentiment analysis. We have some clangers in there!

The one I want to look at today is authenticity.

We throw this word around like we expect everyone to know what it means. So today, we’ll look at what it is and what is definitely isn’t.

Let’s go!

Social media is really just a highlight reel

Every perfect photo, fun video of people dancing or humblebrag story of winning is part of a carefully curated highlight reel on social media.

We tend to forget that this is exactly how people approach their personal brands and business profiles.

Only the best photos. Only the most fun videos. Only the most inspirational words.

In the early days of social media, this was what we were told to do.

Put your best foot forward. Show your best side. Share your good news.

It’s all very… stage-managed.

After all, what would people think if you showed what’s really going on? What would customers think if you admitted a mistake?

We’ve all been trained, educated and socialised to celebrate success and be ashamed of failure. And this has made social media quite toxic.

But there is another way that’s catching on. It’s more genuine. It’s more honest.

It’s more authentic.

How the lack of authenticity online affects?us all

It only takes one glimpse at a coaching group on Facebook to be riddled by well-written, multi paragraph-long posts, attempting to sell the audience of the group.

“I used to be driving a Toyota Corolla, now I’m driving a Lamborghini — check out my new course on how you can do the same.”

Social media has become plagued by inauthentic characters who will do just about anything for money. The perfect example is professional misogynist, Andrew Tate.

It’s not just making themselves look bad. It makes us all look bad.

And it is fuelling a distrust of anything we see online. We don’t know who we can trust at all.

The beginning of a journey to being authentic online starts with taking an honest look at yourself.

If the person you see reflected back in your social media posts, your website copy and your public persona looks and feels like a sham, then you’ve taken the first baby step towards admitting that you may need to make a change.

In fact, authentic self-expression has been shown to be very good for us, too.

Honesty & Transparency

Hyped-up content is all over the internet. But people are cynical and have learned to recognise this stuff pretty quickly. We can all easily spot a person or a brand being fake, and it’s not a good look.

As businesses, we need to stay as far away from dishonest content as possible. That’s obvious.

So let’s take the honesty and transparency a step further.

Get honest and real about your product or service whenever you can. Go behind the scenes and humanise your brand with your social media content.

How?

If you sell a product, share stories about how you make it. Tell people where the materials come from, how you manufacture, or how you design the things you want them to buy.

If you’re a service, share the work that goes into creating your customer experience.

If you’re an influencer, post an unedited photo from your actual phone once in a while.

If you’re looking for a quick lesson in what not to do, look no further than Kylie Jenner. In September 2018, she tweeted that she “had cereal with milk for the first time” and that it was “life-changing.”

This kind of pandering for online attention is incredibly contrived and can damage your reputation.

Case in point: mere minutes later, Kylie was called out on several blogs and in tweets for posting an Instagram of cereal with milk in 2015.

Perhaps a better way for Kylie to be authentic would be for her to say something like;

“It’s been so long since I had cereal and milk for dinner. Sooo gooood!”

Holding back on the urge to?sell

The whole point of a business being on social media is to sell stuff, right?

Well, not really. Social media is a pretty bad place for sales. People aren’t there to buy or be sold to. They are there to be connected, entertained and educated mostly.

But it’s really easy to get caught up trying to turn every online interaction into a quick sale or a conversion by tossing a “Buy Now” call to action on everything.

When it comes to sales, your social media presences work best at playing the long game.

This means it’ll work best by finding a balance between posts that are meant to convert quickly, and posts that are meant to simply connect with people.

Creating positive brand moments using interesting content creates connection, and makes people feel like they’re part of your world. And if people feel like they’re part of your world, where’s the first place they’re going to go when they need whatever you have on offer?

If you’re doing things right, the answer should be “you.”

Owning your?mistakes

Typos, a reply that didn’t land well, a post that just goes over like a lead balloon.

Social media blunders are typically pretty harmless, but mistakes that can also damage your reputation.

It can happen to anyone, and when it does, your first reaction might be to delete the offending content, and forget about the entire thing. But here’s a little not-so-secret secret: you really can’t delete anything on the internet.

The minute you post it, it’s burned into the eyes of the wold wide web. So, if you do make a mistake, own it. And then figure out the best way to fix it.

If your stuff-up is serious enough, you’ll need to do some PR work and do a little crisis management. That’s a topic for another day. But it’s worth knowing that even in pretty serious situations, owning up to the mistake and sincerely apologising for it can help repair some of the damage.

While a few people are like sharks waiting for blood in the water to pounce on you, the vast majority of people are reasonable and forgiving.

Do what you can to fix the issue, and make sure your audience knows what you’ll do in the future to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

Also, when the anxiety becomes so bad that you can’t sleep, remember that social media content moves at light speed. People move on to something else pretty quickly online and there will always be some other drama they’ll turn to.

In something small like a typo or a factual error, own it by correcting it. If you can turn the situation around, or even turn it into a joke, give that a go too.

People love jokes, and a some self-deprecating humour is fun here and there.

Pretending like things never happened, especially when the blunder is quite serious, can cause a pile of problems later.

Stop the clickbait

I get it. It feels good when people respond to your posts.

And baiting people into angry comments or into quick simple answers to divisive questions is tempting.

Things like “which way does the toilet paper go” or “how things were better when we were young” don’t help your business. They just draw in all the wrong people for all the wrong reasons.

At best, you’ll get better stats for the month. At worst, your brand will get caught up in a culture war.

Clickbait is obnoxious and the furthest thing from being authentic.

Same goes for when you try to turn a meme into an ad. It’s cringe-worthy.

If your social content is there just to collect views, clicks, or likes, you should rethink your strategy. You’re better off not posting anything, than posting sub-par content just for the sake of gaining clicks.

That’s all for this weekend. Just one short read about what authenticity is — and isn’t.

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See you again next week.

Cheers,

Dante

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P.S. When you’re ready, here’s a few ways I can help out.

On Monday November 22, I’ll be hosting a free Meta Business Masterclass as part of the Australian Entrepreneurs Alliance E-Fest. You’ll learn about best practice for Facebook, Instagram and Messenger — as well as an in-depth look at Business Suite.

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Dante St James is the founder of Clickstarter, a Meta Certified Lead Trainer, a Community Trainer with Meta Australia, a digital advisor with Business Station, an accredited Digital Solutions advisor and presenter, and the editor at The Small Marketer. You can watch free 1-hour webinars and grow your digital skills at Dante’s YouTube Channel.

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