If anyone knows how to leverage the power of social media, it's Tim O'Reilly. The founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media has a whopping 1,593,190 followers on Twitter--more than the Yankees' Nick Swisher or actress Hilary Duff.
So what's O'Reilly's secret to social media success? Giving, not just receiving. "It’s important to ask yourself, what’s the ratio of creation to consumption in your life?" says O'Reilly, who tweets approximately 10.6 times a day, according to Hashbang.
But it's not just about how much you give--the quality of your output matters. A lot.
"Create more value than you capture," O'Reilly advises. "It really applies to social media. All the people who feel creepy about social media feel that way because they are trying to get more value than they create. All the spammy methods, all the ways of getting more influence, or social climbing. If you focus on creating value, you actually do capture more of it in the long run."
"The people who are really authentic tweeters, those are people who really are sharing with the world," he says. "It’s not about trying to build a profile. Authenticity comes more from giving, not getting."
Check out our crowdsourced guide: #TheRules of Social Media.
[Image: Flickr user FamilyMWR]