This Friday in Dallas, for the first time ever, I’m doing a free presentation of everything I’ve ever learned when it comes to social media. From starting a blog to growing Twitter, I’ll share everything.

The event is free, but there are only about 60 spots open.

If you want to be part of this special edition of the 5 club, we meet from 5AM-7AM and hustle on our dreams, then sign up today!

A few weeks ago, they grabbed my iPhone, took a photo, and then added cats to that photo.

This is what kids do. They add cats to photos.

I then posted that photo on Instagram. It was a funny photo. I’m a dad who loves sharing how awesome my kids are. End of story.

Next morning, L.E. comes downstairs. I tell her I posted the photo.

Her first response was, “How many likes did it get?”

That is why my kids won’t use social media any time soon.

She’s 9.

She doesn’t need to be worrying about how many “likes” something she created got.

I’m 36. I’ve been to college. I’ve worked at a lot of companies. I’ve purchased a house, done my taxes and a lot of the other things you do as an adult and, even so, I have a hard time handling “likes.”

I don’t want to add that to her tiny self-esteem.

When I was in the seventh grade, a guy named Dan Smith laughed at me in the courtyard before school started. He didn’t like the shirt I was wearing. He got other people to laugh. I didn’t feel like I had a whole lot of “likes” in that moment.

But I couldn’t measure them. I didn’t count them. Other people weren’t about to see how low I was on “likes” in that moment, but with social media you can.

I don’t know how old your kids should be before you let them use social media. If you’re a parent and your kids have Instagram, Facebook or Twitter, please don’t think I’m judging your decision.

The title of this post is “Why my kids won’t use social media any time soon,” not “Why your kids shouldn’t use social media any time soon.”

I don’t have the answer for your family. I honestly don’t have it all figured out and will make countless mistakes along the way.

What I do have, though, is a recent realization that as a dad, I want to do everything I can to protect my kids from anything that will force their hearts to ask, “How many likes did I get?”

There’s a new conversation every parent on the planet will need to have with their kids.

I spoke about it a few months ago at a conference. (I took the stage right after they showed a video interview from Jim Collins and hours before Rascal Flatts played. Hence my opening jokes at the beginning.)

If you’re a parent, or hope to be one day, check out this idea and let me know how you’re approaching this.

Social media is either a megaphone or a mask.

It amplifies who you are, sharing your ideas, your thoughts and your personality with a whole world of people.

OR

It hides who you are, allowing you to create an elaborate identity, your own world populated with people who will never know who you really are.

One way leads to freedom.

One way leads to a façade.

Choose wisely.

(Shout out to Lindsey Tipple for creating this image. Check our her portfolio.)

I’m going to tell you how fun it was. Right to your face. Live, right there in the moment, as we wrap up our coffee or lunch or racquetball, I’m going to say “thank you.”

Then I’m going to leave.

Know what I’m not going to do?

Tweet, “Just had an amazing lunch with @__________.”

Why won’t I tweet that?

Because, usually, my motives are ridiculous. I’m trying to impress people that I had lunch with you. Or I’m trying to let people know, “Hey, I get out. I drink coffee that is pumpkin spice sometimes. I do things. Look at me!” (Even after writing this post, I am still doing this nonsense.)

But, instead of admitting that, I pretend I tweeted everyone who follows me so I could show you how grateful I am to hang out with you.

But I can really show that gratefulness right to your face. Like humans did since the dawn of time until about 6 years ago.

If I don’t tweet about our meeting, it’s not because I don’t like you. It’s because I like you so much I told you thank you to your face. Or as you might call it, “your real retina display.”

The only exception will be if something funny happens while we’re having lunch. If something comical comes from our lunch, something the rest of the world would enjoy knowing about, then awesome. I’ll tweet that. I like to chuckle. So do other people.

This will save you and I from having the silly conversation I had with my wife the other day. After having dinner with a friend, I asked her, “Is it bad etiquette if I don’t compliment him and that dinner on Twitter now? Is that like Emily Post 2.0?”

My wife looked at me and said, “Did you tell him thanks when he was here for dinner? If yes, then stop it. You’re being silly.”

So I’m stopping it.

And I look forward to telling you how awesome you are at racquetball right to your face.

Like these 9 lessons bacon teaches us about social media.

All this time I’ve been reading blogs from social media experts when the answer was so simple: bacon.

We all know how Twitter viruses work.

A spammer sends you a direct message (The Twitter version of an email.) In the message is a link. When you click on the link, it takes you to a page that looks like the login page to Twitter. You login with your name and password at which point the spammer has control of your account. They then proceed to send a direct message to each of your friends as if they were you. (You can only DM people who follow you.)

The most successful Twitter viruses try to claim that someone is spreading horrible rumors about you. In a moment of panic you click the link, give up your password, and the virus has won.

You think it won’t happen to you, but it happened to 17 of my friends on Twitter. So to make sure you don’t get tricked, here are the statements that fooled them. If you see one of these in a direct message, do not click the link.

17 things no one is saying about you on Twitter:

1. Hey, someone is spreading nasty rumors about you.

2. Hey, someone is spreading terrible rumors about you.

3. Ur famouse now.

(In this variety they try to scare you that there’s a video of you online somewhere. I personally like that this one sounds you like became a famous mouse.)

4. Whatt are you doing in this?

5. You ar famous now haha

6. Lol I cant believe ur in this video

7. I bet you don’t remember this eh?

8. They got u on facebook

9. How did you not see them tapping you?

(I think they mean “taping” but maybe that’s not a typo and this is about a video of someone tapping me on the shoulder a bunch of times and me not noticing.)

10. Nude photos of Justin Bieber leaked after his laptop was stolen!

(This is not actually a statement about you, but it’s the worst. This one is embarrassing because it means one of your friends thought that was true and clicked on the link to see the photos.)

11. there’s some absurd rumors going around about you, here’s the user that started it

12. wat r u doing with him in this video? ROFL

13. I bet you can’t remember this lol

14. Some really absurd claims that mention you are sufficing on twitter, I found several tweets here’s an example.

(Suffice it to say, I am horrified to hear that.)

15. Some really ludicrous accusations that mention you are sufficing on twitter, I found several posts here’s an example.

(They used to be absurd, now they’re ludicrous! This is getting out of control.)

16. You seen what this person is saying about you?

17. It’s you on this photo?

Again, these aren’t hypothetical viruses. These are 17 statements that Twitter friends of mine fell for.

Don’t make the same mistake.

Don’t click the link.

No one is talking about you.

I promise.

I think that sign is true. In fact, I think it’s true about more than just customer service.

I think this sign could say:

Good meetings at work depend on your availability.

Good marriages depend on your availability.

Being a good dad depends on your availability.

Being a good mom depends on your availability.

Chasing a dream depends on your availability.

Getting a promotion depends on your availability.

Being a good friend depends on your availability.

Being good at kung fu depends on your availability.

Maybe I got carried away with that last one. I only made it to blue belt in Kenpo, so I can’t really talk kung fu with any degree of accuracy. But I did get great customer service at the pizza place in Portland, Maine. And I do want a great marriage.

So it looks like I better be available.

Because I can’t explain it in 30 words or less.

I was reminded of this dilemma recently when I found the brilliant blog “Pocket-Sized Stories.” What’s that blog about?

Allow me to share the first 30 words you see at the top of it:

“When you teach kindergarten, the things that you bring home in your pockets every day tell that day’s story. Every day, I’ll empty my pockets and tell my story.”

That is perfect.

Who is writing this blog? A kindergarten teacher.

What is it about? The things he has in his pockets at the end of the day.

Why is that interesting? Because those things tell a story.

In less than 30 words the author of the blog gives an incredibly compelling reason to read his blog.

Is that important today?

Yes.

And it will be even more important tomorrow because, every day, 100,000 new blogs are started. Clarity is a great way to differentiate yourself from the masses. Although it’s harder to explain your blog when it has multiple topics (leadership, parenting, writing, etc.), it still needs to be done.

Can you summarize your blog in 30 words or less?

I can’t…yet. But I found a great example of someone who has, and I’m headed in the right direction.

Question:
What’s your blog about?

Here are the 3 things you should do immediately:

1. Check to make sure you’re the only person following them.
If you constitute 100% of their followers, then they should be meeting 100% of your personal needs on Twitter. Proceed to step 2.

2. Check to make sure your unfollow button isn’t working.
If it is, just go ahead and unfollow them without letting them know or announcing it publicly on Twitter. If your unfollow button is broken, proceed to step 3.

3. Demand a full-money refund.
Ask them to pay back the money you’ve personally paid them to follow them on Twitter. The customer is always right.

This process should fix 100% of the Twitter problems you’ll experience if someone decides tweet in a way you don’t like.

Happy tweeting!

Jon

A few days after that, someone told me I wasn’t using Pinterest the “right way.”

A few days after that, someone told me I wasn’t using Instagram the “right way.”

The funny thing is they’re all wrong.

Not because I’m using them the “right way,” but because there is no right way. There’s only my way and your way and your friend’s way and your brother’s way and everyone else’s way.

Social media is like a dinner party. And right now, the world is full of experts who will loudly tell you, “That’s the wrong way to throw a dinner party! A dinner party has to be inside and have at least four courses. There has to be a vegetarian option, local organic cotton placemats and a dessert that, at some point, is on fire.”

And then you, at your outdoor crawfish boil and table scattered with corn and potatoes and buckets of drinks think, “Wait, why is this guy telling me how to throw my dinner party? I like to be outside. I like to grill and throw the Frisbee and have dogs and kids swirling about in the backyard. That’s how I do a dinner party.”

If that happened in real life, you’d never listen to that person. If anything, you’d probably make sure you never invited them to your party, and then proceed to boil more crawfish. Or post whatever photos you like online, or use Pinterest however you want.

Can you learn from other people further along the path than you? Of course. Folks like Michael Hyatt have provided me with an insane amount of wisdom and encouragement in the world of social media.

But don’t listen to experts who say you’re not doing some form of it the “right way.” The whole thing is like an hour old. None of us are doing it the right way.

Part of the problem, he said, was that “comedians can’t take criticism.” I think he was right, but I think it’s more than just comedians who can’t take criticism. I think most humans can’t take criticism. Especially online.

So here’s Louis CK’s simple advice to comedians (and me and maybe you) for handling online haters.

“If you don’t like the person, stop googling yourself every ten seconds. Cause nobody’s making you read it.”

That is perfect.

The best way to handle online haters?

Don’t.

If you ignore haters and don’t go looking for it, you’ll be surprised how very little of it finds you.

Question:
Have you ever googled yourself? (I’ll go first. I have, a lot. And the results very rarely made me feel better.)

A few weeks ago, they grabbed my iPhone, took a photo, and then added cats to that photo.

This is what kids do. They add cats to photos.

I then posted that photo on Instagram. It was a funny photo. I’m a dad who loves sharing how awesome my kids are. End of story.

Next morning, L.E. comes downstairs. I tell her I posted the photo.

Her first response was, “How many likes did it get?”

That is why my kids won’t use social media any time soon.

She’s 9.

She doesn’t need to be worrying about how many “likes” something she created got.

I’m 36. I’ve been to college. I’ve worked at a lot of companies. I’ve purchased a house, done my taxes and a lot of the other things you do as an adult and, even so, I have a hard time handling “likes.”

I don’t want to add that to her tiny self-esteem.

When I was in the seventh grade, a guy named Dan Smith laughed at me in the courtyard before school started. He didn’t like the shirt I was wearing. He got other people to laugh. I didn’t feel like I had a whole lot of “likes” in that moment.

But I couldn’t measure them. I didn’t count them. Other people weren’t about to see how low I was on “likes” in that moment, but with social media you can.

I don’t know how old your kids should be before you let them use social media. If you’re a parent and your kids have Instagram, Facebook or Twitter, please don’t think I’m judging your decision.

The title of this post is “Why my kids won’t use social media any time soon,” not “Why your kids shouldn’t use social media any time soon.”

I don’t have the answer for your family. I honestly don’t have it all figured out and will make countless mistakes along the way.

What I do have, though, is a recent realization that as a dad, I want to do everything I can to protect my kids from anything that will force their hearts to ask, “How many likes did I get?”

You’re right.

Pinterest is just for girls.

Is it the third most popular social media network in the world? Sure, but you would hate it guys. It’s all photos of knitting and gluten-free cupcake pops and kittens who have locally sourced cotton sweaters on.

Stay off of Pinterest. In fact, if you could stay off it for the next 6-12 months that would be incredibly helpful to me.

Whatever you do, please promise me you won’t talk to my author friends who told me two years ago that “blogging is silly and not worth my time.”

If you want to win on Instagram, there’s a one-second trick that anyone on the planet can do. Ready?

Tilt.

That’s all you have to do.

If you want to win on Instagram, just tilt your camera. You tilt the angle of your photo and, suddenly, you’re an app version of Ansel Adams.

Here, I’ll give you an example:

This is a cup of pens. 

This is a poem.

Did you see what I did there?

It was fast, hopefully you didn’t miss it.

Question:
Do you use Instagram?

I’m going to stop talking.

Wait until they realize I have.

And then hold up a small sign that says, “Are you still listening?”

You with me?

We are the guinea pigs.

We are the first generation of parents in the history of mankind that has to have a digital footprint conversation with our kids.

Your parents didn’t need to do that. Your parents’ parents didn’t need to do that. Your parents’ parents’ parents were trapping muskrats for their pelts.

You will go first. I will go first. My wife will go first. That is a lot of responsibility, and that’s why we’ve already started figuring out some very deliberate social media lessons for our six-year-old and eight-year-old.

Is that too early to have that discussion? Nope. Because the world starts talking far earlier to your kids than that. And it’s not a question of whether they will learn to navigate the potentially awesome, potentially dangerous world of social media.

They will. When you refuse to address something with your kids, it doesn’t mean it won’t get addressed. It just means it won’t get addressed by you. The world is more than happy to fill the void your absence creates.

There is a tremendous responsibility in setting precedent, but there is also tremendous fun. We get to be the pioneers! We get to set the pace! We get to go first!

The next generation of parents will learn from us how to teach kids about social media. My hope is that we will leave them a legacy of directions to follow, not a history of disasters to avoid.

Question:
Do you have any rules about social media with your kids?

5. Community.

In order to build a community, you have to decide which type of approach to social media you are going to take. And there are basically only three approaches:

1. Passion Approach

2. Ideas Approach

3. Personal Approach

In the passion approach, you write about everything related to one particular passion. You love knitting. You are crazy about knitting. And it’s your greatest desire to write about all things knitting. My blog Stuff Christians Like is an example of the passion approach. I write about Christian satire on that blog, and that’s it. In order to write about chasing a dream and hustling, I had to start a new blog instead of trying to cram those ideas into SCL.

In the ideas approach, you write about your ideas on a broad range of subjects. You are saying, “This item just passed through my filter of thinking. Here’s what I think about it.” Seth Godin’s blog is a great example of an ideas approach. He writes about publishing and marketing and dreams and business and a huge range of subjects, instead of just one singular passion.

In the personal approach, you write about every part of your life. This is like a reality show, where instead of cameras, you use social media to share. My friend Carlos Whittaker’s blog Ragamuffinsoul.com is a brilliant example of the personal approach. When he and his family decided to adopt, they didn’t just write about the idea of adoption. They took the whole world on the adventure with them to South Korea. And, in the process, they inspired other people to adopt.

There are some blogs and social media platforms that blur these approaches. But, for the most part, people pick one path and stick with it. The business blogger you love is not going to write about problems he’s having in his marriage. Carlos is not going to write worship leader posts for a solid year at the exclusion of everything else. And the reason is simple: communities want to know who you are.

If you read a blog about knitting for a year, and then all of the sudden the blogger said, “Today’s post is about how I’m having a hard time feeling loved by my husband,” that’d be a weird experience. We’d spent a year building a relationship around a passion approach, and now there’s suddenly a hard left turn into personal. If the Pioneer Woman deleted all her topics except one and said, “From now on I’m just focusing on writing about an obscure form of cattle breeding,” there’d be a disconnect. You spent years getting to know that amazing blog as an ideas approach, and the sudden transformation into a passion blog would be disappointing.

That doesn’t mean that you can’t evolve over time, but if you’re not deliberate about what your blog or social media platform is all about, your community will never know either.

And if they don’t know who you are, they’ll never know why they should be part of your community.

Last week, we talked about the first three C’s of social media dominance: content, context, and clarity. Today let’s talk about:

4. Consistency

Two years ago, the readers of my blog Stuff Christians Like raised $60,000 to build two kindergartens in Vietnam. It was an incredible experience, and it firmly cemented in my mind the power of what a generous community can do online.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution wrote an article about the first kindergarten, and the headline was, “Blogger raises $30,000 in 18 hours.” Technically, that headline was true, but the headline should have actually read, “Blogger raises $30,000 in 18 months.”

That’s how long it really took to raise the money. For 18 months, I consistently wrote Stuff Christians Like. I poured in a million words of the best ideas I could think of into the conversation with readers. Day after day, post after post, with consistency, I jumped into the discussion happening on Stuff Christians Like.

And I had written a different blog for a year before I started SCL. I didn’t show up one day out of the blue and say, “Hi, my name is Jon. You’ve never heard of me. Give me money for a kindergarten,” but sometimes we think that’s how social media works. We watch certain ideas go viral and think our business, cause, blog should go viral too. We want social media to be a silver bullet. Here’s the truth:

Social media isn’t a silver bullet. It’s a million free bullets.

If you use them with consistency and clarity, you can change the world.

If you try something for a month, though, and give up, you won’t change the world. If you write a blog for 90 days and quit, you won’t change the world. If you fool around with Twitter for a week and then stop, you won’t change the world.

It takes time.

It takes grind.

And it takes a commitment to consistency.

In the old school, “Who? What? When? Where? Why?” model of journalism, content is the “What?” context is the “Where?” clarity is the “How?” and consistency is the “When?”

When will you share your message?
When will you reach out to people?
When will you keep writing, blogging, and tweeting even when the results you’re looking for aren’t there?

On Wednesday, we’ll talk about the fifth word, “Community.”

(If you’re coming to the Quitter Conference, I’ll go into much more depth during our social media session.)

Earlier this week, we talked about the first two C’s for Social Media Dominance, Content and Context. Today let’s talk about:

3. Clarity

A few months ago, I had dinner with a friend of mine. He’s a social media consultant. He gets paid thousands and thousands of dollars to help companies with their social media strategies. During the middle of the meal, he leaned forward and confessed something quietly, “I know I’m supposed to be using Google +, but I just don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing.”

And as silly as that might sound, I feel the same way.

I’m pretty sure it’s awesome. I mean it’s Google, after all! Who doesn’t love Google? But whenever I check in or log in or whatever verb you use when interacting with +, I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do.

I’m positive there must be some stream of conversation going on somewhere within the platform. There must be some reason it’s awesome, but I can’t find it. So, after a few minutes of poking around I return to the platforms I do know how to use, Twitter and Facebook.

And it turns out, so do a lot of other people. The Wall Street Journal reported that, “Visitors using personal computers spent an average of about three minutes a month on Google+ between September and January, versus six to seven hours on Facebook each month over the same period, according to comScore, which didn’t have data on mobile usage.”

Will Google + bounce back? Maybe. That team is brilliant, but they won’t until they fix one thing: clarity.

Clarity is the way you carve out some space in the cluttered social media world. It’s how you tell readers and followers and fans and customers, “This is what I’m all about.” It’s your idea stripped down to its bare essentials, so that the most distracted generation in the history of mankind can instantly understand where you fit in the social media landscape.

This one takes time. No blog ends up a year later being exactly the way you planned it. No social media campaign does exactly what you expected it would. The only way you develop your voice is by using your voice. And often you have to use that voice for 6 months to a year until you’ve got clarity.

My blog is an example of that. I know exactly what Stuff Christians Like is. I have a sense of clarity about that. I have very clear rules for guest posts because I know the voice of the site. I’ve been writing it for 4 years. Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday are satire. Wednesday is Serious Wednesday. Friday is a guest post.

This blog? JonAcuff.com? I’m not there yet. Sometimes I write about parenting. Sometimes I write about writing. Sometimes I write about chasing your dream. Sometimes I write about social media. Can all those topics play together? Sure, but I haven’t figured out how yet. I don’t have great clarity.

To use the store metaphor, clarity is why Apple doesn’t sell 100 different laptops and desktops. When Steve Jobs returned in the 1990s, he started editing their product line. He winnowed it down to just the bare essentials. They make 4 primary products: iPod, iPad, iPhone and Mac.

They have tremendous clarity about who they are and how they do things.

They communicate everything they do with clarity.

If you want to dominate social media, you need to do that too. If you redesign your blog every month, I’ll never learn how to engage with it. If you make your social media activity so complicated I need a manual to figure out how to engage with you, I won’t.

That was the brilliance of Instagram, as a friend pointed out to me. He said, “Do you know why Instagram was able to enter an incredibly crowded social media landscape, photo apps, and dominate? They said ‘no.’ They resisted the urge to add features and features and features. They fought to keep their core competency and did a very small number of things brilliantly.”

He’s right. I tweeted about 50 photos in three years because the process was clunky. Then Instagram came on the scene with off the charts clarity. In less than a year, I’ve posted over 500 photos to Instagram. That’s the power of clarity.

In the old school, “Who? What? When? Where? Why?” model of journalism, content is the “What?” context is the “Where?” and clarity is the “How?”

How will you share your message?

How will people engage with you online?

How will your content be simply and powerfully presented?

On Monday, we’ll talk about the fourth word, “Consistency.”

(If you’re coming to the Quitter Conference, I’ll go into much more depth during our social media session.)

Question:
On a scale of 1-10, with 1 being “people have no idea what I’m trying to say online” and 10 being, “people know exactly what I’m all about,” how do you rank on clarity?

On Monday, we looked at the role “Content” plays in Social Media Dominance. Today, let’s talk about:

2. Context

I think it was the brilliant Gary V who first said, “If content is king, then context is god.”

Dramatic? Of course, but he makes a great point. Context changes everything, and I learned that in a maternity ward in Boston almost 9 years ago.

My wife had given birth to our first daughter L.E. in Brigham and Women’s, a hospital right near Fenway Park. As I was returning to the room with ice chips, the only real value I was able to provide in those first 24 hours, I noticed something out the window. I walked over to the edge of the waiting room and couldn’t believe what I saw.

Eight stories down from where I was standing was a billboard for a Toyota minivan.

What surprised me about it was how it was positioned. You couldn’t see it from the street. If you were driving through Boston, you couldn’t read the billboard or really even tell what it was for. The angle from the street was horrible, but some advertising genius didn’t care about the street. They cared about the waiting room I was in right that second.

The billboard was tilted perfectly to grab my attention. The billboard was aimed right at that window, a window where new dads and new moms and new grandparents were sitting. People who suddenly had a deep need for a minivan. People who had entered a new season of life and were suddenly very interested in a vehicle they might have ignored before they entered the hospital.

That is what context does.

It takes an idea and places it in the exact moment you need it.

It’s so powerful that it can even turn an ad into content.

For instance, when I worked at AutoTrader.com, a fantastic company, our most popular page was our search feature. When someone would search for a car, we would show them an ad. If you were looking for a used Honda Civic, and we showed you a promotion for a home mortgage, that was an ad. That was out of context.

If, however, you were looking for a new car because you were moving to a new house and were going to have a longer commute, that same promotion would no longer be an ad. It would be content, something helpful we provided you at the moment you needed it. The ad wasn’t an ad. It was content because you were in the market for a home loan.

To jump back to our store metaphor from Monday, context is what you put by the registers. Target doesn’t stock televisions by the register because they’d be out of context. No one, while checking out has ever said, “Oh good, I meant to pick up a 42-inch television and there’s one right here by the register!” Instead, Target puts small items there. Batteries, chapstick, things you forgot to get in the store but are likely to buy at the last minute. They put their products (content) in the right place (context).

In the old school, “Who? What? When? Where? Why?” model of journalism, content is the “What?” and context is the “Where?”

Where will you share your content?

Where are people looking for your content?

Are they in a season of life in which your content would help them?

On Friday, we’ll talk about the third word, “Clarity.”

(If you’re coming to the Quitter Conference, I’ll go into much more depth about the 5 C’s during our social media session.)

Question:
Where can you find your audience?

I don’t consider myself an expert, especially since I haven’t put in the 10,000 hours of expertise yet that folks like Malcolm Gladwell talk about. I still end sentences with prepositions for instance.

But I have been swimming for a few years, and I’ve learned a few things. Lots of them by failing, some of them by floating into the right wave at the right time, a few of them on purpose.

So this week, as I work on creating the most intensive guide to social media I’ve ever built for the upcoming Quitter Conference, I thought I would share the 50,000 foot view.

There are only 5 words you have to understand in order to dominate social media. Here’s the first one, with the next four coming in the days to follow:

1.Content

If you had a nickel for every time someone told you that “content is king” you could have been the one who purchased Instagram.

This word has been bandied about so often on the Internet that it’s become a cliché, which is a shame, because content still runs social media like Jay-Z runs New York.

So what is content? Let’s demystify it.

Imagine you owned a store. You were having a grand opening. You spent hours and hours promoting your big day. You spent thousands of dollars inviting people to the ribbon cutting, doing everything you could to drive traffic to your location.

The day arrived, the parking lot was slammed full of people and it was a wild success …and then you opened the doors. And all the shelves were empty. In the excitement of promoting your store, you forgot to stock it. You’ve got an immaculate layout. The store isn’t just a store, it’s an “experience.” The design is unbelievable … but it doesn’t matter. People were expecting products. And as soon as they took a look behind the curtain, so to speak, and realized the store was empty, they left and never came back.

Content = Products.

That’s not just true for businesses, but that’s true for bloggers too. Even if you never want to sell a single thing via social media, if you want to build a community, you have to have a foundation to build it on. And that foundation is the content.

If you start with the promotion, the building will be well known and well ignored.

If you start with the design, the building will be beautiful and empty.

If you start with the community, the building will be temporarily crowded but eventually abandoned.

Content is king.

Content is currency.

Content is critical.

In the old school, “Who? What? When? Where? Why?” model of journalism, content is the “What?”

What blogs will you write?

What videos will you share?

What will you create?

Or, in the Facebook/YouTube model, what content will you enable other people to create on your platform? CNN didn’t start the “iReport” feature, which allows people at home to submit their own news, because they like lowercase letters. They started it because it turns the entire country into content machines. And content matters most. The times I’ve forgotten this have been the times I’ve made my biggest mistakes with social media.

On Wednesday, we’ll talk about the second word, “Context.” But the other words won’t matter a whole lot if we don’t get this one right first.

Question:
What content do you currently create?

Truth be told, I was there to see the Penguins of Madagascar. I would watch that show even if I didn’t have kids. If you think I’m missing Madagascar 3, you’re crazy.

While I was there, I took some photos. While reviewing them on my phone, I noticed there was something hidden in the bottom of one.

In the front row of the performance, there was a guy videoing the whole thing with his iPad. Here’s a picture of him. (How meta is this moment? I’m writing a blog about a photo I took with my iPhone of a man videoing something with an iPad?)

This photo captures something I’m curious about in my own life.

The weird thing is that, because he was filming the show, he watched the entire thing through an 8-inch screen. Even though he was on the front row and surrounded by the real, honest to goodness, 3D performance, he experienced the whole moment through his iPad.

And it’s not just Shrek performances that happens at either. A few weeks ago, I wrote about how musician Skrillex yelled this at a crowd, “You can’t party through a screen. Put your phones away!”

The truth is, this is not easy. It’s tempting to experience life through a four-inch or eight-inch screen. But here’s something that might be even cooler.

The 360 degree screen you’ve already got.

We can experience life through a revolutionary retina screen or directly through the retinas all the technology in the world can’t capture.

The eyes we have. The senses we’ve been given. The big screen all of us have already won.

Document moments that matter to you. Video with iPhones and iPads. I think that can be great. But never try to live your entire life through a screen. You’re life is bigger, more colorful, and more awesome than that.