The Trick Is Applying General Knowledge To Specific Needs

How does this apply to me?

That should be the question we ask when encountering learning about the digital marketing world. Whether you’re reading a blog, a book, attending a webinar or conference, the one thing you won’t likely get is advice and examples that are directly applicable to your specific business.

Conference speakers are generalists. People who write books are, too. Their job is to be informative and helpful but appeal to as broad an audience as possible. If I were to speak at an event about how to leverage Twitter in medium-sized floral shops, I would only help a few audience members. If the talk is how to leverage Twitter for any business — a general approach — there’s more appeal.

The challenge then becomes taking that broad knowledge and applying it to your business. Unfortunately, there is no Easy Button in digital marketing. You’ll have to do the work. Or you could hire one of these speakers or authors to come in and apply their general knowledge to your specific business. But that can be cost-prohibitive for some.

This is the concept that spurred us to collaborate with Exact Target on the Social Media Domination Road Tour this summer. We wanted to get more specific with people. We wanted them to leave the event with a roadmap more specific to their business. If you come, you will do most of the work, but with guidance from us. We’ll help you work through the lack of the Easy Button and send you home with a framework and head start on your 2014 strategy.

So if you can join us June 13 in Philadelphia; June 26 in Atlanta; July 18 in Washington, D.C.; July 30 in Dallas or August 21 in Minneapolis, expect less “conference” and more “workshop.” It’ll be fun.

Register now for the city nearest you.

How does this apply to me?

In the meantime, though, put yourself through the exercise. Go read a blog post from someone helpful or look through a book you’ve read recently with some good digital marketing pointers. Then think it through: How does this apply to my business?  

Some things will. Others won’t. Distinguishing those will help you move from wishing you could figure it all out to actually figuring it all out, one idea at a time.