Company owners, association executives, and entrepreneurs all fall victim of allusions, delusions, and illusions from their investment in online activities. The differences in the spelling are quite subtle however they have a significant impact on the bottom line if the one who writes the check is unaware of its meaning and the effect it has on building customer loyalty, increasing sales, and improving customer morale.
In this post I’ll share with you the definition of each one and its impact on the message being shared online.
Allusions
It’s not what you post on social media, it’s what the other person hears.
When I arrived in San Francisco for the National Associaiton of Realtors conference I posted on Facebook, “Let the games begin!” How would you interpret that? One of my friends commented that I’m now engaged so ladies must stay away. How did Allison interpret that? She wasn’t happy. My intention of the post was to show my excitement for the conference, meeting with my clients, and networking with new ones even though it might have been interpreted as if I was looking for something else..
It is easy to make more meaning out of post, a comment, or a like when others don’t have the real story. After all we rush to make posts, send text messages or only have 140 characters on Twitter so how can you express intent in addition your message? Literary authors leave the reader hanging on the interpretation by creating allusions of what might happen next. It might be good for a novel but on social media not such a good idea.
Delusions
Website owners fall victim to delusions when they don’t demand results, know the metrics to improve, or follow best practices. They simply make the investment in a website and abdicate their responsibility to their web designer, programmer, or host. I often hear “We have a website coming soon, We are working on our site, or Don’t look at my site!”
Questions to ask your website provider:
- What is my bounce rate?
- What is the average pages per visitor?
- What is my conversion rate on multiple offers?
If they don’t know, tell you, or deliver reports on a regular basis it might be time to find someone new.
Illusions
Online marketers, SEO experts, and social media marketers can be deceptive by saying, “We can get you to the top of the search engines, We can increase the # of leads, or We can increase the $$$ of sales” but when you ask them for testimonials of their previous work you get nothing.
Because the online marketing world has many different specializations it is impossible to be an expert in every category of social media, email marketing, search engine optimization, online conversion, e-Commerce, web design, analytics, etc. When someone poses themselves as an expert in each then you know to run like the wind. Don’t fall victim to the illusions they create because not only will you waste money but most importantly your time getting back on track.
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