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These days, it seems like everyone’s an “expert.”
As you scroll through your LinkedIn feed or peruse the subreddits, you’ll likely find an endless trove of unsolicited advice. And it’s not always good.
“I have followed numerous sources of advice from online sources over the years,” says Lisa Richards, CEO, and creator of the Candida Diet. “A lot of it was unhelpful and didn’t actually help in solving the business challenges I was facing at the time. I was much better off experimenting with different solutions and finding the most effective one for my business.”
Improving your ability to discern superficial from high-value insights from online networks is crucial. Here’s how to know when and how to accept unsolicited social media advice.
Why there’s so much unsolicited advice online
Social media is RAMPANT with unsolicited advice.
“You should post X times a week to grow your network.”
“Only this type of content generates leads.”
“If you’re not doing this, your business will suffer.”
It’s exhausting. But it makes sense why this has become so prevalent. To many, giving advice has become a marketing tactic, especially in online spaces.
Forty-six percent of Americans’ customer journeys begin with online research. That said, positioning yourself as an authority in your field is an excellent way to reach your target audience at the top of the sales funnel. Even better, establishing yourself as a leader among colleagues can do wonders for growing your network.
But here’s the catch: Anyone sharing professional advice online should have the experience to back it up. Unfortunately, many don’t – and taking their word at face value can hurt your business.
Unsolicited advice
Advice that was not asked for and that was possibly unwanted.
Offering high-value insights or advice for free is commonly seen as a promising marketing tactic, networking method, or lead generation strategy. Unfortunately, not everyone who practices this is qualified to provide professional guidance or consultation.
Not all advice is suitable for you
Not every piece of advice will apply to you. Some might make your situation worse. For example, one of the most common pieces of social media advice swirling around is “post daily.”
To the average online guru, posting online once or twice weekly isn’t enough to grow your brand or network. You’ve got to really push yourself and make your presence known at precise times, every day of the week.
At a glance, this seems reasonable. But in practice, it can be a huge burden. Even if you do it in advance, creating fresh content for every day is a heavy-lift activity that could make for a hefty workload.
That said, how realistic such advice is depends primarily on the individual’s role, capacity, resources, and clientele. The same goes for other popular types of unsolicited advice. Because of these caveats, it’s crucial to take online advice with a grain of salt. Not every “insight” is meant for you. More importantly, not all advice comes from qualified professionals.
Here’s how to sharpen your eye to distinguish value-packed from valueless advice for your unique circumstances.
1. Assess the situation
David Garvin, former professor at Harvard Business School, and Joshua Margolis, former professor and head of organizational behavior at HBS, say that the key to protecting yourself from unnecessary or misleading advice is to assess your own competence first.
This means you need to have a clear understanding of what your problem is and your capacity to address it before seeking any external input.
For example, imagine you’re having trouble generating leads. Think about why this is such a challenge. Factors that could be contributing to the struggle include:
- Your industry
- Your product or service
- Your marketing channels
- The age of your business
- Your target audience research (or lack thereof)
Once you know exactly what you’re struggling with, you’ll be better able to parse out valuable information from advice for clout. Plus, you’ll have a better idea of the type of insight you need. Skipping this step will make you more vulnerable to misinformation or shoddy advice.
Different types of advice you might need
Garvin and Margolis propose four different types of advice, each applicable to unique circumstances. Discrete advice is the most straightforward. This is essentially when you need help with making a specific decision.
Let’s return to our lead generation example. Discrete advice might help you decide whether you should use LinkedIn or Twitter as your primary marketing channel. In this case, you’d be looking for recommendations for or against a particular option.
A few small steps above this are two slightly more complex advice types: counsel and coaching. The former entails problem-solving guidance or providing a framework for navigating future challenges. For example, tips on setting your prices as a self-employed professional would fall under this category. Coaching is similar. The difference is that it focuses on improving your individual skillset instead of helping you to follow a formula or set of rules.
Lastly, there’s mentoring. This is a professional relationship that encompasses advice-giving. Overall, it’s aimed at advancing your career.
I’m going to give it to you straight: Your criteria for who makes a good mentor should not include the content of their social media posts. (That is, unless those posts are full of ethical red flags.) Online advice can be an indicator of someone’s professional prowess. Otherwise, it’s just a drop in an ocean of characteristics that make someone qualified to aid or influence your career.
Once you’ve determined the exact challenge you’re facing and your current capacity to address that problem, you’ll better understand which advice type is most suitable. If you think your subpar lead generation is due to a poor pricing structure — when it’s merely your choice of marketing channels — you’re more likely to look for advice in all the wrong places. You’d search for counsel when all you really need is discrete input, costing you time, money, and peace of mind.
2. Know who’s qualified to offer advice
Know who you’re talking to. Taking business advice from strangers on the internet is one thing – taking it from an anonymous “guru” is a whole ‘nother issue.
Here’s why this is such a problem: You should be able to vet the people you’re accepting guidance from. If an individual claims that a special technique earned them 100 sales in 24 hours, you should be able to verify that. Without a name, fact-checking is much tougher.
“My number one rule for approaching online advice is to never put 100% faith in any channel that allows anonymous posting,” says David Aylor, Founder & CEO of David Aylor Law Offices. “People can use eloquent writing and professional-sounding jargon to make themselves come across as more well-read than they truly are.”
Depending on the advice-giver’s business and their role in the company, you might be able to look up earnings data to verify their claims. If you find low earnings, they’re probably not generating as many leads as they claim. Further, this might indicate that they’re giving out faulty information or they’re unable to implement their own guidance efficiently.
“Is the person giving the advice an expert in the field?” asks Nathan Sanders, CEO of Plumbing Navigator. “Try and do a basic search of the author to determine if they are a well-known, highly reputable figure in the field you’re concerned with. It’s also important to determine if they’ve authored any books or research papers in this field, and if they have the right academic or professional credentials to be offering business advice in the first place.”
Beyond that, it’s good to look up details like attendance at live events, such as webinars, the size and composition of their online networks, and past reviews or testimonials. All these details can reliably indicate the reach and efficiency of the advice-giver’s outreach, which will further indicate how trustworthy their guidance might be.
3. Determine your motivation
Determining the type of advice you need also requires knowing why you’re seeking it at all. This goes beyond your understanding of your problem and relates more to your expectations of the advice itself. If you’re looking for validation instead of constructive feedback, you won’t get far.
Take a hard look at yourself and your business. Misconceptions of your circumstances will dilute the value of any advice you receive, no matter how qualified it may be. For this reason, it’s best to limit accepting insights to those who are facing or have faced challenges similar to your own.
But be warned: Comparing your circumstances to someone online can be destructive. “Most advice spouted on LinkedIn is wiped clean of any messy failures or survivorship bias,” says Alex Birkett, Co-founder at Omniscient Digital.
It’s easy to portray picturesque success on social media – which is why so many people do it. For this very reason, it’s best to seek guidance that’s tailored to your unique needs—not superficial, blanket statements that are designed for likes and shares.
“The best advice is individualized, which negates most forms of advice given on social media,” Birkett adds. “That’s not to say it can’t be helpful, but it has to apply to your specific context.”
This doesn’t mean you have to reject social media advice altogether. Instead, you just need to add a few steps to what we’ll call your “acceptance process:” Reach out to the advice-giver and ask for more information. A one-on-one conversation is more likely to get you more tailored, authentic guidance that is more actionable. Just be prepared to pay a consultation fee!
4. Test new advice wisely
There’s nothing wrong with trying online advice… sometimes. It’s not all bad. When you come across qualified information, it can actually help improve your business and alter your perspective in productive ways.
Still, this is rarely true (depending on your network). In some cases, the only way to know the true value of the advice is to put it to the test. Fortunately, there are ways to do this without putting your entire business at risk.
Small-scale implementation
You don’t have to go all in if you decide to try out some tips and tricks you found online. Play things safe by keeping it small-scale.
For example, imagine someone in your industry posts about how to improve newsletter open rates. They suggest using action-oriented subject lines instead of ones with emotional appeal. This seems like a viable alternative, so you want to try it. The best way to do it: Segmentation.
Divide up your newsletter subscribers and assess the advice’s suitability with an A/B test. This way, you don’t have to risk your entire newsletter’s open rate with an idea that can potentially fail.
You can apply this same logic to other advice types – go small in case things don’t work out.
Limited-time trials
No change has to be permanent. Limited-time trials can offer more flexibility in implementation and recovery time, in case of failure.
“We’re time-poor as entrepreneurs and sometimes it’ll only take one failure for us to throw out an idea,” says Ray Slater Berry, Founder & Director of DSLX. “My advice would be: Go with your gut feeling on if it’s a fit for you, implement, and if it fails, then fail fast and learn from it.”
Temporary applications of new ideas can also make it easier for your team or clients accept changes. Company shifts and restructuring are notoriously challenging to implement smoothly. They can cause a lot of confusion, leading to potentially debilitating and costly mistakes.
Yet, limited-time, small-scale changes that are themed seasonally (e.g., holiday offers) or through special promotions may be easier to accept, increasing your chances of success.
Learn how to handle unsolicited advice
Online advice is a dime a dozen. People can make themselves seem more knowledgeable online than they really are. So, you must be discerning when deciding when and how to accept the latest “expert” insights flowing through your feed.
You don’t have to assume the worst of every tips-and-tricks or how-to list you come across. But knowing the challenges you face, the types of guidance you need, and having a strategic plan to test appealing advice can help to protect your business’s integrity.