I wonder how often Alexander Graham Bell heard people say they wouldn’t want one of those new fangled telephone things dingling in their home; or how many times John Logie Baird was told that his television contraption would never take off?

Why are we always resistant to change? No matter how good something is, it is always the same. We poo-poo it, resist it and dismiss it. We fight it and push it away. In fact we do almost anything we can other than embrace it.

Time and time again, generation after generation, new technology gets dismissed as a passing fad – ‘Something not for us’. Fax machines, Dishwashers, Mobile phones, the Internet…. The list goes on.

In more recent times it was websites. The number of times I heard a businessman tell me his business wouldn’t need one of those, I couldn’t possibly recall. Companies that ‘didn’t do email’ were ten-a-penny.

It’s as though it’s a cycle we must go through before we can do anything at all. It’s as though it’s a fight we have to have, to prove ‘we know best’.

Well today’s ‘fight’ is Social Media. Today’s tussle is whether Social = Social or Social = Business. And, as ever, the businessmen who know best are struggling to embrace it.

Cutting to the quick, whether they want it or not, every business will eventually ‘be social’. It’s inevitable; as unavoidable as tomorrow coming after today. Why? Because their customers will force them to – They’ll insist on communicating with them in the way that they want.  And if the business won’t adapt, the customers will simply move to a competitor who will. Who has.

So why resist any longer? Embrace, adopt and adapt. Without all the kicking and screaming, it’ll be so much easier. And not only will you learn a whole lot more a whole lot sooner, you’ll be better prepared for that next wave of new technology to fight over.

For help in adopting and adapting, see how 2nd Impression can manage it all for you.