There are many reasons why businesses avoid taking the plunge into social media, but I’ve started to believe that one of the biggest (and unfortunate) reasons is that they are afraid of what they might learn. Many businesses would rather continue slogging along they way they have for years, rather than listening to what their customers have to say. Or they are actually afraid to drive traffic to their website or through their doors — because of what their customers might see.

The website will be finished in a few more months, they rationalize. We’ll start doing social media then. Our headquarters is due for a renovation. We’ll begin interacting online once everything looks nice.

In truth, all businesses are a work in progress. If you wait until everything is “perfect” before you start engaging with your customers, you’ll never start. You can start small and build slowly, but you’ve got to start sometime and somewhere. So why not here and now?

Westchester Social Media invites all businesses to join the conversation both here on this site as well as on our Facebook page. The fast-growing  community already includes scores of the region’s very best social media minds, and we’re going to continue to push to make it the best possible resource for you and your business or organization.