You don't have to have Facebook to succeed

I quit social media in January 2020.
I have to admit, I never got caught up with Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok.
Facebook was my addiction.
Like every addiction, I find myself peeking back at it hoping it recognizes me.
I hate it.

It’s a powerful tool, but so is a John Deere 9620RX. I don’t need it either.

In the beginning, connecting with long-lost friends was nostalgic. It was fun to catch up and reminisce about things long gone.
Then the world changed. Marky Mark Zuckybaby needed to figure out how to make money with his new invention.
Users shared personal information, they liked and shared data.
Z-man turned the data into algorithms so he could micro-target his users for his advertisers.
Then things started to change.

People posted pictures of food, vacations, new houses, and expensive cars.

“Friends” unleashed prejudices, stereotypes, thoughts unto anyone willing to read.

I didn’t like the changes. I wanted the new house, the smiling kids, and the speedboat. I didn’t want to hear opinions about politics, race, and religion.

Dark thoughts led to darker journeys as I crawled into the emptiness of my head.
Each corner had piles of trash. Someone hadn’t cleaned in a while.
The doors were black with no doorknobs. With no way to open them, I cried for help.
The echoes of my tears in the darkness revealed the emptiness of the room.
Or was it my soul?

I’ve come to a simple realization. The older I get, the less I know.
Maybe that’s wisdom.

My friend Nicola asked me, “Do you know you know OR do you think you know?”. She was referring to biases we base on what we’ve read and what we’ve experienced.

To rephrase Nicola’s wisdom, “I think Social Media is bad” and “I know it’s bad for me”.
It’s like slinging a thousand tiny blades toward my twinkled toes.

Experience is supposed to teach us lessons. Those lessons are to guide us towards what to do and what to avoid.

In an uncomplicated world, with no variables, those lessons would be hard-nosed facts.

We don’t live in Mayberry. Things are always a-changing.

And facts are not always facts in a different setting. They’re merely opinions.

Let me explain. Imagine you wanted to grow your business.
Talk to a sign company and he’ll say you need to have a big sign at the road, with blinking lights.
Talk to a radio rep and she’ll explain that reach and frequency is the winning horse and you need to advertise on her radio station.
Seek out a digital marketer and they will confidently talk to you about click funnels, cost per click, social media engagement and Google AdWords.
An ad agency will want to change your logo and brand identity.

Of course, all those things can play a role in growing your business.

But so can these:
Clean your parking lot.
Raise your prices.
Train your sales team to upsell.
Review customer service calls.
Lose fewer customers.
Buy a competitor and add its customers to your sales.
Introduce a new product.

Growing sales is as easy or as difficult as you want it to be.
You operate and sell in a business world where there is no vacuum. Unless you actually sell vacuums.

“What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.”

Mark Twain

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