Like all of us, Riley is guided by her emotions and the film, through personifying her feelings – Joy, anger, Sadness, disgust and Fear – explores how we need our emotions to guide and sustain us through life’s challenges. When Riley’s emotions start to disagree on how to help her deal with the dramatic changes she faces in a new school, with new people and a new life, things start to fall apart.
I couldn’t help but draw some parallels between the turmoil in Riley’s brain and that faced by many small business owners grappling with their social media. At worst these conflicting emotions can have the effect of shutting people down to the very idea of social media, as they become paralysed by fear and hide from it quivering; at the other end of the spectrum they can encourage a careless, “fast and loose” approach with little regard for the quality of one’s content or the expectations of a discerning audience.
So, let’s take a quick look at how each of our emotions – if allowed to take control– can affect our social media, and how to combat these extremes.
Fear
This is the BIGGIE. Most of us worry about social media on some level, and this is good, because it helps keep us on our toes, but when fear is in control it can overwhelm us to the point of doing nothing. It might sound something like this:
What if I say the wrong thing?
What if I get negative feedback?
What if nobody follows me?
When fear has you in its grip, remember that everybody has to start somewhere. Take some positive action: watch, listen and learn from others to build your confidence and plan your approach. Most importantly: accept that mistakes will be made…..and go for it!
Joy
Left unchallenged, Joy can take away our fears, reservations and instinct for self-preservation. Plunging into social media with utter abandon and recklessly “mouthing off” will do little to attract and maintain an audience. Be positive, by all means, but make sure that you have planned your campaign well and that you are posting only quality, relevant and meaningful content.
Anger
There’s no denying that social media can be frustrating for small businesses; nothing happens overnight and getting yourself established can be a long and rocky path. Left to its own devices, your Anger may yell out:
This isn’t working!
Everybody is better at this than me!
It’s a waste of my time!
When Anger’s battling for control like this, remember to be patient: social media takes time, you won’t get everything right first time, things will most definitely NOT always go according to plan, and you WILL get better as you persevere.
Disgust
Disgust keeps Riley from being poisoned, both physically and socially, and a healthy aversion to certain aspects of social media is no bad thing. Not every platform is right for every business, and there are certain styles, formats and subjects that just won’t fit with your brand. But remember, sometimes it’s the things we avoid the most that we should be giving our attention to. For example, if the thought of doing a webinar, or joining Periscope fills you with revulsion, maybe you should seriously think about biting that particular bullet and seeing if it’s as bad as you’d feared.
Sadness
One of the most important messages shared by Inside Out is that it’s OK to be sad: trying to pretend that everything is great just leads to confusion and meltdown. And so too with your social media: you might be disappointed that your sustained efforts don’t seem to be making an impact; maybe your Facebook ad flopped and was a waste of money; maybe your posts aren’t generating engagement. The important thing is to accept the reality of things, acknowledge what hasn’t worked and use those facts to learn, move on and make improvements. Social media, like growing up, is a bumpy road and it’s OK to feel a little lost sometimes.
A really healthy approach to social media will be influenced – but not controlled – by Fear, Joy, Anger Sadness and Disgust. As long as you stay grounded and don’t let any emotion take over, you will be able to stay focused, alert, realistic and determined. So don’t be afraid to take chances and put yourself out there; don’t be disheartened when things don’t go according to plan, instead, acknowledge your feelings, accept them, and let them work together to guide you through the challenges.
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Images sourced from Google Images. Disney Pixar
