Your Engage Cliff Notes

by Jennifer Kane, @janekaneco

Engage is a great book. I read every last stinkin word in

it … I underlined stuff (with a straight edge!), made
notes in the margins, emailed passages to clients and
tweeted my favorite quotes.

Problem is, I am totally not normal.

I am a reader. Hard core. I don’t watch TV. I don’t play

video games. I have no hobbies or social life.

(Wow … that sounds really pathetic, doesn’t it?)

All I do is read … books, blogs, magazines,

newspapers, backs of cereal boxes, you name it.

What’s more, I also read business books. (I run a business book club – thanks to
all who’ve dropped by – and I know that this is an even more rare breed of
people.)
So, when I see people tweeting that they’re anxious to tackle Brian’s book before
or after the event, I get a little nervous.

You see, Brian’s book is really good, but it’s also really … well, epic. (At our book
salon, some people said there were sections that “made their brains want to
explode.”)

Never fear though, I figured out a way that you can get your “Engage” fix and that
gin and tonic too …

The “Engage” Cliff Notes.

Let me start by saying this:  I really think you should read Brain’s book in its
entirety.
You should try to drink eight glasses of water a day, floss and “live your best life,”
too.
The reality is that many of you won’t.

However, I’m willing to bet that you’ll read parts of this book, and some is better
than none. If your time and attention is limited, hopefully these Cliff Notes can
help you determine which parts those should be.

So, (with many, many, apologies to Brian) pick your profile and let’s get started
…
1. “I’m clueless about social media, but I want to find out how
to get started.”

 I’d suggest you start at the beginning of the book with Part I: The New
Reality of Marketing and Customer Service.
 In Part II: Forever Students of New Media, read the Social Media 101
section and all the 201’s (201, 202, 203).
 You may be in over your head with some of the 301 information and totally
floundering in the 401’s and the “MBA” sections, so I’d suggest you
instead skip ahead and read Part III: Brand Representative Versus the
Brand You and Part IV: We are the Champions.
 You might just want to stop after Chapter 19 and revisit the book later after
you’ve had some time to go use what you’ve learned in the social space
and get more comfortable with the tools/technology/tactics.
2. “I use social media, and kinda know what I’m doing, but I still
have a lot to learn.”

 Start at the beginning of the book with Part I: The New Reality of
Marketing and Customer Service.
 In Part II: Forever Students of New Media, read the Social Media 101
section, as well as all the Social Media 201’s (201, 202, 203) and Social
Media 301’s (301, 302, 303.) If that information isn’t freaking you out, go
ahead and tackle the Social Media 401’s (401, 402, 403). Your brain will
likely be hurting after you’re done, so if you decide not to read the MBA
information right now, that’s totally okay. I’m sure Brian will still love you.
 Read all of Part III: Brand Representative Versus the Brand You and
Part IV: We are the Champions.
 If you’re up to it, tackle Part V: The Social Architect: Developing a
Blueprint for New Marketing and maybe stop after Chapter 22 and
revisit the book later after you’ve had a chance to process and apply what
you’ve learned.
3. “Social media is part of my job at my
company/agency/consultancy and people are looking to me to
show them how it’s done. I need to make sure I know my stuff.”

 You should really read this whole book, you know that right?
 Obviously, read Part I: The New Reality of Marketing and Customer
Service.
 Then, since you’re working with these tools on a daily basis, you may want
to skip ahead to Part III: Brand Representative Versus the Brand You,
Part IV: We are the Champions and Part V: The Social Architect:
Developing a Blueprint for New Marketing. There is good information in
these sections and you don’t want to be fried from reading all the New
Media University stuff when you tackle it.
 You should read Part VI: A Little Less Conversation, A Little More
Action: Rising Above the Noise, but I’ll admit that the Social CRM/VRM
info can be a little overwhelming. You may want to just skim Chapters 23
and 24 for now. Chapter 25 though (Measuring Investment Returns) is an
essential read, though. Do not skip this.
 After you’ve had a chance to digest what you’ve learned, don’t forget to
revisit the book later and read the New Media University section. I
guarantee you there will be some tools and tactics in there that you
haven’t used or thought of yet.
4. “As a business person, I get that we need to get on board with
social media, but I just want to know what I’ll be hiring people to
do and to how to fit this into our operations.”

 Start with Part I: The New Reality of Marketing and Customer Service.
 If you’re not going to be doing any of this, just managing it, you might want
to just jump to all the business stuff in the back of the book and revisit all
of the details about what social media is and why it works at a later time.
This, (for obvious reasons) is not the best way to read the book, but it
might be the most realistic way to tackle it for your situation.
 If you are particularly strapped for time and just want to get down to
business, you should definitely read Chapter 17 on establishing policies,
Chapter 22 on building teams, and all of Part VI: A Little Less
Conversation, A Little More Action: Rising Above the Noise.
 For a more informed approach though, instead of reading chapters out of
context, start at Part III: Brand Representative Versus the Brand You
and read from there until the end of the book.
 It would be good for you to know that stuff in Part II: Forever Students of
New Media, so don’t forget to revisit the book down the road and review
when you’ve had some time to process or before you start sending our
RFP’s for people to help you with your social media plans.
5. “I got this under control, already. I’m a social media rock
star/guru.”

One of my favorite quotes from Brian Solis is that he considers himself to be

“forever a student of social media.”… and he is one smart dude.

Point here is we all have stuff to learn.

If you consider yourself to be a guru, then I guess my recommendations for you

are …
 Read the book.
 Then, go write one of your own.

Who knows? Maybe if you play your cards right, someday you’ll get your very
own Cliff Notes too.