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by Tina VonderHaar on 12.22.2009 in Company News 0

Welcome to the new Brighton blog.  After months of preparation, we are excited to launch this blog and give you an insight to how we think, create and engage audiences.  This is a company blog, open to anyone in Brighton, so you will see posts from all disciplines of the work we do.  We plan on updating it at least once a week, so check back often to see what we are thinking! Now onto my first blog post…

I find it rather ironic that the social media team has asked me to write this inaugural blog post given my reluctance to join in the social media “revolution.”

So, after facing my fears, I sat down with pen to paper … yes, PEN TO PAPER … and let go of my inhibitions to share some of my thoughts.  Please don’t judge all of the blogs that you will find on Brighton’s site base on my blog post!  We have some great writers with great ideas that will be providing much more insightful content in days and weeks to come!

After much thought, I decided the best topic for me to expand upon for the first Brighton blog post is my view of the social media space.  Many members of the Brighton team are laughing as they think of the mountains they have had to climb in order for me to embrace “social” as a means to communicate.  But the more I thought about it, the more I realized I’ve been a champion of social media for many years and have been “marketed to” in social media before social media sites ever existed.

So how is this possible?  Well, think about it.  When my kids were little and I would do my shopping on Amazon.com, where was the first place I went?   To customer reviews!  When booking travel on Travelocity, how did I pick my trips? Through customer recommendations.  Isn’t this social media?  People talking about products and brands with complete strangers.

Now, the leap for me (and many people my age!) is the idea of social “sites.”  And the more I have thought about it, it’s not so much the site itself, but rather the time it takes to go to one more place online.  I heard once that we spend 85% of our time doing things we are obligated to do and 15% doing things we want to do.  Well, my 15% gets filled pretty quickly and has not yet included social sites.

Herein lies the challenge. But, our social media team has recognized that there are people out there like me that just need to be led into this realm a little differently and they are letting me enter at my own pace.  As a result, I now have a Facebook and Twitter account.  I also have friends asking me why I haven’t added them as a friend yet.  (Turns out some people can get a little pushy in this space!)

The social media team assures me that once I get involved in the conversation, I will enjoy it.  I just need to figure out which part of my 15% “me” time will get bumped.

In the meantime, I will continue to engage in online communities and social media on the sites I already frequent … the Brighton site being a good example.

And for those of you reading this who can relate to my story … email me!  I’ll hook you up with our social media team and they’ll make you a converter too!

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