Your social media castle.

You've just launched your organization's Twitter account. What do you do next? Tell people about the next big offering? See how much traffic you can drive to your site with witty one liners and a link? Bombard followers with tweets? Make them inquisitive with half-sentences that require them to follow your disguised tiny-url link?

I know traditional marketers who want you to do that ... and, to some degree, it can be effective (But at what cost ... will you get kicked out of the barbecue?). I would argue that these tactics comprise a short-game approach, therefore the benefits are short-lived. 

The long-game approach: Castle.

If you've ever played chess, you've heard the term "castle". Without getting too detailed, castling—the act of moving the king and the rook simultaneously—effectively protects your king from attack. It's a swap, of sorts, between two chess pieces to create a fortified position.

For social media, castling comes from giving. Your client just received an award—tweet that. Your employees completed a volunteer project—tell the world. Someone offered to help you—praise them. Praising yourself might build a marketing plan, but praise of others builds castles.

Example: You're a nonprofit. You just found out that a bank offered to sell tickets to your next event. The classic marketing angle would dictate that you tweet, "Tickets now on sale at ..." or "Get your tickets now at ..." But why sell yourself? The bank has already offered to do it for you. Take your tweets a step further with praise for their volunteerism, "___ is grateful to (bank) for saving the (your mission). Thanks for selling tickets at each location!" Thanking them gets the message across and so much more.

Example: You're with a real estate firm and you've reached the closing on a newly built property. You could tweet the grand opening. You could tweet the economic impact. You could tweet that this makes you number one in sales for the region. But really, is that the best you can do? 

What if you praised the contractor for completing the project so quickly? What if you praised the bank, title company, appraiser or any of the other players for doing a great job? That's something everyone likes to read and that's how to start building your castle. You've still announced the closing, but you've done it in a way that thanks others for their work and professionalism.

Next, take the philosophy to Facebook by posting a photo of everyone standing in front of the property. Then write a glowing caption—not of the property, but describing everyone's hard work. Last, tag each person in the photo. They'll be updated that they were tagged in a photo and so will their friends, family and clients. Now you've used social media to help someone. Now you're building castles.

Then, what do you think will happen?

Call it karma. Call it the law of human reciprocity. Call it whatever you like, but now there's a reason for others to start praising you. So when you do a great job, win an award, mark an anniversary, etc., guess who tweets and re-tweets your success? The people you praised.

Let's suppose you get some negative press (it happens), guess who defends you in the blogosphere, tweetland and Facebook? The people you praised.

That's a social media castle ... and it can only be built by giving.