That’s Right. You. The Small Business Owner. You can pay others to do a lot of the work for you, and get results. But if you truly want to see results in social media, you are going to have to fork over some time and genuinely try to engage with communities online. It’s a commitment, but it can pay off.

The term “Social Media” has been adopted much like the term “Web 2.0″ was a few years back. Many of my clients want to use Facebook and Twitter, but don’t actually know why. There is a powerful mass adoption of certain social tools throughout the business world, however, I believe it is mainly based on copy-cating rather than trying taking action based on business need.

Take myself for instance, even I am at fault. I have a Twitter account for this business that I have difficulty maintaining. If you are not actively engaged in your social media tool, it will provide little relevance or use to your business.

I am a proponent of reserving URL/Twitter and other social media names for your business as a preventative and future strategy option. However, I suggest defining your website and online strategies and goals prior to implementing a tactical tool. Otherwise, you’ll find that you wasted your valuable time and resources implementing something that does not provide the value you were hoping for and takes a lot of time to maintain.

Then, there’s the question of authenticity.

Is it okay to pay others to update your social media sites? To represent you as a human? Of course its okay to outsource help. AND I do know from reading many case studies that the more successful examples of social media interaction occur when you yourself are making the updates and engaging online.

It doesn’t have to be forced. I have found one of my sites to gain a lot of success and traffic simply by me engaging in online tools, commenting on sites that I care about and researching. I did it because I was truly interested and wanted to spend the time. And it worked well for my site. Paying others to do this CAN work, but its not going to work as well as if you, the small business owner yourself, dedicate the time to building your online presence and engaging online with others in a genuine manner. That is the ticket to authenticity and success. Sometimes it just takes a little of your own dedication and time. You can outsource a lot of the setup, the grunt work and the help, but try to put some time into it as well to build relationships that will evolve into more sales and revenue for your business over time. The soft sell works better online than advertising, and it takes your own voice to resonate as genuine.