Building off of last week’s article on surrounding yourself with those who are different from you, this week I want to discuss sharpening your focus. I am an avid learner and am constantly developing new skills; I am fully aware of my potential and ability to learn, and the possibilities often seem limitless. But I know I will not be able to do and learn everything. This is where I know I need to sharpen my focus so as not to become overwhelmed and ineffective.
My example in last week’s article about learning to leverage social media is also a perfect example for this week, as we look at how sharpening your focus can help in achieving success. When we decided to move forward using social media as a tool for developing our platform, we went full force on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
Each of these platforms required different knowledge and skills to use effectively. I found that focusing on all three of them was limiting our impact. We resorted to using an automated tool that would make the posts on all three platforms for us on a schedule. While these kinds of tools can be very helpful, my team found that by switching to this, we were no longer engaging with the audience we were trying to build.
We quickly figured out that by attempting to focus on every avenue, we were not maximizing the potential of using any of these platforms. Without a larger team or a full time social media manager, we simply were not going to be effective with our current strategy. So we refocused.
4 Questions We Considered
- What is preventing us from being effective?
- Will one option be more beneficial than the others?
- What is our end goal?
- How can we sharpen our focus to accomplish this goal?
As we walked through these questions we took the time to understand what was preventing us from being effective and growing. Upon further investigation, we discovered that for my particular brand, LinkedIn was the most essential platform to develop. We decided our end goal was to grow and network within this platform while using it to share valuable ideas and tips. We sharpened our focus solely on LinkedIn and I was able to fully develop the skills necessary to use this platform effectively.
By sharpening our focus to one, we were able to maximize our impact and truly achieve success with social media. While your situation may be very different than choosing which social media platform to use, how can sharpening your focus benefit you and help you achieve greater success?
