The Rockstar Complex

One of the great things about social media is how it can connect you with thousands of people you would otherwise never know. This makes it easy to  be exposed to new things, learn from them and become more informed and smarter about business every single day. Indeed, social media has helped to vastly improve my knowledge base on so many things digital. And I owe it to the people I’ve connected with. Thanks.

But like so many wonderful things there is a dark side. Too much champagne creates obnoxious dinner guests. And too many followers  can create obnoxious tweeters, bloggers and human beings.

My four year old love to say, “that’s not how you do it. Let me show you how to do it” after figuring something out on her own or being shown something by her pre-k teacher. She wells with pride and is hoping for a pat on the back and a little admiration. I’m sure this reminds you of a blogger or two that is looking for a little more than an opportunity to share.

Fortunately, this is as far as it goes for my daughter. You see her audience has yet grow – it’s still limited to her immediate family. So far she has yet  to build 6,000 twitter followers and then morph into the the obnoxious, Rock Star, social media maven.

But frankly we all need to be conscious of loosing perspective once we get a little following. So how can you recognize if you’re suffering from the Rock Star Complex?

  1. You constantly preach transparency but you don’t respond to tweets or comments on your blog because you’re so gosh darn busy.
  2. You have an auto-play video of yourself on your blog that illustrates how great you are.
  3. You refer to yourself in the royal “we.”
  4. You’re constantly writing about how great you are rather than sharing great information.
  5. You spend more than minute talking about yourself as a brand and not your business.
  6. You call business trips “road trips” or even “tours.”
  7. You think about how you will blog about a job more than how you will deliver value to your customers.
  8. You think you’re more important and smarter than your readers.
  9. Your original profession has been subsumed by the marketing of you,  your blog, your e-books, and your workshops.
  10. You’re thinking of hiring a personal assistant.
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Posted on: August 10, 2010, by :