Computers are the perfect example of something we learn about and then must constantly update that knowledge. It’s like we have all had to become scientists or doctors. Just a few years ago, computer storage was measured in megabytes. Then it reached a thousand megabytes and we moved on to gigabytes. When we reach a thousand gigabytes we need terabytes.
As a public service, here is something to memorize so you can be as smart as a fourth grader:
1 Bit = Binary Digit
8 Bits = 1 Byte
1000 Bytes = 1 Kilobyte
1000 Kilobytes = 1 Megabyte
1000 Megabytes = 1 Gigabyte
1000 Gigabytes = 1 Terabyte
1000 Terabytes = 1 Petabyte
1000 Petabytes = 1 Exabyte
1000 Exabytes = 1 Zettabyte
1000 Zettabytes = 1 Yottabyte
1000 Yottabytes = 1 Brontobyte
1000 Brontobytes = 1 Geopbyte
In the 90’s when everyone needed to have a website, we all learned the same thing…that just having a website wasn’t enough. We needed to update it every month, then every week, then every day just to keep the traffic growing.
Fast-forward to today and we have personal websites, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. The principles learned in the 90’s are still there…update, add, change, update some more, etc.
The greatest deterrent for good use of the personal media is the myth that it must start great and get greater in order to draw friends or fans. Rather, we must view all this as a marathon run one step at a time.
Marketing guru Seth Godin warns of never actually “shipping” anything because we wanted to get something perfect. Justin Lloyd states it this way…”Perfection is the enemy of progress.”
Get started in social media. Do a little today, add something small tomorrow, another couple things next week…build it brick by brick. Strong buildings are built that way. It is like writing a book and publishing a page at a time…and that’s OK in the new media world.
Suggested reading are two books by Gary Vaynerchuk… Crush It and The Thank You Economy. Gary is the king of social media. First person to max-out his friends on Facebook…he has a waiting list. There are principles in these books that can apply to any author or publisher using social media.
This is good to know. One less question for me to ask my college son to explain.
Thanks!
Like the turtle who won against the rabbit, steady progress will get me there. I like this. It helps relieve that feeling of being overwhelmed at the constancy of social media.
Great suggestions here, Dan. I had no idea that there were so many different degrees of bytes. I’ve learned something new and it’s only only 8:00 a.m. my time.
I’ve gotten into social media slowly. Finding time to write with a young family and balance social media has been quite the challenge. I’ve tried to learn one major form of social media a year. Maybe two. Facebook, Twitter (last summer), blogging (this spring), and I think I’ll try to figure out Pinterest without becoming addicted sometime this fall.
Thanks for the reminder perfection is not the goal.
I like your schedule, Jeanne. It’s too much to tackle at once, isn’t it?
Yes, Meghan. It is! I don’t do justice to what I’m already doing. How do you manage it, homeschooling mother of six (is that right?)?
Jeanne, here I go showing my ignorance. I can’t figure out how to reply to your reply! 🙂 I’ll admit I don’t know Twitter. I’ve tried, and I just don’t get it. So that’s my next project. I know enough Pinterest to get by, but I haven’t learned much about “liking” others’ pins. Blogging took most of one summer to learn the technicalities. It’s just a little bit at a time, fifteen minutes there, twenty minutes there. And yes, I homeschool my six children, but they are quite independent, and my husband is a college professor so he is home more than with a traditional M-F, 8-5 job. 🙂
Thanks, Dan, for letting us converse in the comments. 🙂
I love this, Meghan, it’s like we’re talking languages here, rather than social media. 🙂
Love it, Jeanne! I’ve always wanted to be bilingual.
Thanks for the welcome information. It relieved some of my social media stress as this is how I started–and am still building my blog and website–brick-by-brick.
Thanks so much for this post, and especially for that handy chart. 🙂 For some reason that old riddle comes to mind: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. ~ Or in this case, I guess it’s one BYTE at a time?! 😉
Blessings, Patti Jo
Sigh. Yes, social media is a marathon. And, as a character in my book experiences her life, “like running a marathon at gunpoint,” so I’m a reluctant, but persistent participant. Trying not to get discouraged, remembering that the goal is to till the ground, reach readers.
When I think of how my blog started over two years ago, I shudder. Many of those early posts have been deleted. As with nearly every endeavor, there’s a learning curve to social media. In the past year, though, I’ve found some level of comfort with blogging, and it’s continued to grow. Thanks for the encouragement to continue with one more brick, Dan.
I started my first blog in 2008 — and did just about everything wrong.
Aside from all that I learned, I have enough posts to repurpose for a book or two, plus the practice of regularly blogging helped me improve as a writer.
Just yesterday a publisher who’s considering my novel asked me to update my social media numbers from those I submitted with the original proposal many months ago. I’ve been turning all shades of crazy over whether my “numbers” are good enough, what they say about me as a writer and as a person, am I funny enough, am I engaging enough, am I worthy, will “I have X followers on Twitter” evoke a yea or a yawn… So it’s refreshing to read that modest, incremental improvement is okay, as long as it’s moving in the right direction.