Here's a short video we made recently for Nucleus' YouSpeakTelevision on YouTube.  

It's for the financial adviser market and highlights some key tips on how to use Social Media in their businesses.

One of, if not the central benefits and tenets of using Social Media, is the human, conversational aspect of it, which allows people to feel that you are being engaged with, rather than being advertised at.

‘People buy people’ and all that, and great use of Social Media helps to replicate the human experience.  Getting a human face into your Social Media efforts is, not surprisingly a key part of humanising your brand online – something that most marketers agree is essential for companies who are looking to engage with and add value to their customers.

So it was with some disappointment when I turned on the sports news on television this morning, to be greeted by a clutch of Premier League football managers explaining to the media how they saw this weekend’s games panning out.  They sounded like they were preparing for a funeral.

True, most Premiership football managers usually tend to address the media in a tone that suggests they are about to lose their job, and this may well impact their demeanour, but come on guys – cheer up!  Let’s see some energy, spirit and fight and let’s kick into touch the incessant dour expressions.

If that’s your idea of a human face, then frankly it doesn’t have much appeal to me, or I’m sure many other people.  I don’t know about you, but the people and brands who use Social Media to try and engage with me, need to be friendly, approachable, upbeat and helpful; you know, kind of normal.

And when I stop to think about the companies and brands whose updates I most enjoy on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, they all, without exception have a human face – and an attractive, sociable, responsive one at that.

Does your brand have an open, pleasant, gracious and friendly human face online?  Do you listen, answer questions and help people out – or does your brand's face look miserable and depressing to the core?

I know which I prefer.

Photo courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

As London and the world reluctantly get back to work after the amazing Summer of Sport, commentators are reflecting not only records made on the track, but records made by the Olympic and Paralympic Games themselves.

Record levels of tickets were sold, and demand for tickets exceeded all expectations.  But many people are also staggered at how Social Media came into its own over the Summer, with more tweets and Facebook posts about the games than ever before.

In many ways that’s hardly surprising because users of Facebook and Twitter have increased significantly since the Beijing 2008 Games.  Nevertheless, the conversational nature of Twitter brought an additional human dimension to coverage of the events.  I also enjoyed seeing countless photos of families and people I know posing at the Olympic Park – with many of them striking Usain Bolt’s now famous pose.

And we didn’t hold back with our use of Social Media.  According to Twitter, there were 150 million Olympic related tweets sent over the 16 day period, with Usain Bolt’s 200m victory alone seeing 80,000 tweets per minute.  What’s more, 40% of all Britons online visited the official London 2012 website, which is an incredible number whatever way you look at it. 

And according to figures from Neilsen, the London 2012 Games featured in 19% of all Social Media conversations on 27th July – the day of the opening ceremony.  There were also more tweets about the Olympics on that single day than during the entire duration of the Beijing 2008 Games.

The point of this post though is not to spout statistics; we can take it as read that Social Media played a massive part in enriching the overall experience of the games.

But for me, one of the most valuable ways that Social Media ignited the Games, was how it connected athletes to ordinary people.  Before the Games, there were stories that athletes were going to be banned from tweeting and using Social Media, but right from the moment that they started checking into the Olympic village we knew that we were going to be treated to wonderful behind-the-scenes glimpses into their world.

What was particularly heartening for me, came at this week’s special parade of athletes in London.  Many of our new Olympic and Paralympic heroes were interviewed by radio and TV, and it struck me how many of them said how amazed they were that people – many of them children, had been inspired by their performances, and that through Social Media they had been able to express that directly to them.

Nicola Adams was the first woman to win an Olympic gold medal for boxing and is now widely seen as a role model for a new generation.  Nicola told an interviewer that people had tweeted her saying that "she had inspired them to take up sport".  And Jason Kenny the track cyclist said that people had been tweeting him telling him how excited they were that they had just bought a new bike.

With all the talk about which Brands had won Gold in the ‘Socialympics’, it was great to hear the human side of how Social Media played its part in the Games – connecting people to each other and to their sporting heroes.

And that surely is what Social Media is all about?  (There’s a clue in the title: Social.)  

Many of the Brands sponsoring the Games gained many new followers, but also failed where it really counted – engaging with people.  According to Unmetric (a social benchmarking company), despite posting almost 11,000 times (the highest of any sponsor), Coca-Cola were failing to engage followers - whilst the most engaging sponsor was Omega, who posted just 37 times.

There’s a lot to be said for the numbers game and having a high number of followers, but ultimately it’s what you do with them and how you engage with them that really counts.

As to whether you can truly inspire them and change their life is another matter entirely.

This little boy (my son Ben) had his day/month/year well and truly made yesterday when a Blue Peter (the world's longest-running children's television show) badge turned up in the post, complete with letter from the BBC thanking him for the great effort he had put into drawing a picture of one of the presenters.

I also received a Blue Peter badge when I was a similar age and I can still remember feeling that it was a mark of true recognition (along with the Cycling Proficiency badge) which I happily showed off to my friends.  

My wife managed to top both of us, because she proudly boasts a Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award.  I got a letter from Valerie Singleton, but she got one from HRH the Duke of Edinburgh.  We’re hardly competitive at all in our family...

In today's world of Facebook and Social Media, recognition is all too easy to dish out.  With the click of a mouse we can tell people that we like photos of their new puppy, we like photos of their dinner, we like their witty remarks, we like their rants at politicians – we like everything and anything.

Brands adore Likes.  It’s the new measurement of how loved they are; advertising agencies dream up ways to attract Likes for their clients – they even run competitions in exchange for Likes.  The world wants to be liked.

Putting the psychology of wanting to be liked to one side for a moment, whether you are a brand looking to increase sales or an individual building a career, recognition from our peers is becoming increasingly important, because if you are online in any way, shape or form, you are more visible than ever.  

People, customers, prospects, future employers get to see you in more detail than ever before.  They see how you conduct yourself, they get a sense of your expertise and they get a strong feel for your personality.   Like has become the currency of reputation.

How likable are you online?