Learn from the Big Boys – Connections R Us

Want to be a real, live, in-the-flesh Social Media Marketer Extraordinaire? Start with these steps. Seriously.

The Daily Dose of Advice comes from Scott Stratten, UnMarketing himself.

“Reminder to take 5 minutes to reply to others today. Engage. Interact. Build.”

But how, really, truly, do you DO that? And can you invest only 5 minutes and make connections?

Well, yes. And no. We went with 10 minutes, you may want 15 or 20 or 30. But 2011 is all about small steps toward big things. So here goes.

1. Set the e.ggtimer. We said that you can learn from the big boys here, and there’s no bigger boy in the world of lifestyle redesign than Tim Ferriss. He’s the guy who first tipped us onto the timer. It is awesome for two reasons: (1) simplicity and (2) keeping you on task. We recommend you set it for 10 Minutes.

2. Begin surfing. We recommend you do this BEFORE looking at emails but AFTER getting your daily fix of Facebook and Twitter. Why? You want to get some mental cues from what you’ve seen on those sites – but you don’t want to make this reliant on what work is clogging your inbox.

Huh? Well, there are folks we are friends with on Facebook and connected with on Twitter who aren’t world famous. That’s part of the mission here. Learn from the Big Boys, but connect with the others, too.

3. Comment if you have something to add. We hit up a couple sites upon the recommendations of friends and contacts. On Quora, which is getting a tremendous amount of buzz, we had, well, nothing to add. Yet. But the standout site from Danny Brown got us thinking. And commenting.

4. Keep track. Chris Brogan recommends a spreadsheet or a Google Doc or a CRM program. Awesome.

Is that it?

Well, this should be part of a daily ritual. ESPECIALLY if you want to make real connections with real people.