Why you shouldn’t freak out about the latest social media sensation

“Damn, I Wish I’d Thought of That!” asks: Remember Vine?

I do, just barely. When it suddenly got visible, a hot wave of anxiety washed across the nonprofit world: How do I make Vine work for my program? Consultants fanned the flames. Bloggers bloviated.

For what?

Guess what? It didn’t matter at all if your business used Vine or not. And if Vine had turned out to be the next Pinterest, you would have had plenty of time to catch up — there wasn’t much advantage in being early. The Lesson: It’s OK not to freak our about new social media. It’s OK to ignore them until your customers/prospects want you there.

Most Next Big Things go nowhere. Most that go anywhere take awhile to do so. And they take the longest to become part of the lives of our largely older donors.

So don’t worry about the Bitcoins, the QR codes, or any other Big Deals people talk about. If they turn out to matter, you have plenty of time to get on board. Let others with bigger budgets and/or more gullibility to the research and development for you!