DISQUS

jon burg · 6 months ago

I'm with you, this industry needs someone to lead. But I think there are MANY people claiming to lead. There are people who practically live on the road, attending conference after conference, speaking as visionaries and industry leaders. However, as an emerging industry in a fairly democratic/level playing field, there are many voices with many individual perspectives.

What makes one a leader?

Marketing Crumudgeon · 6 months ago

As someone who has been around the social media game for a while (paying clients, speaking engagements, etc), I call it marketing, because that's what social media is. It's just another channel to reach people to get them to buy stuff.

Most social media authorities are charlatans of the get-rich-quick in the comfort of your own home ilk. The deafening hype from 20-something know-it-alls is exhausting, which is why most of my peers stay out of the scene for the most part because there simply isn't much value to what most people are selling.

Most people who actually know what they are talking about simply keep their heads down, working hard to collaborate with paying clients - keep a low profile and get the job done.

The pseudo-celebrity and navel-gazing in the social media space is sad, the funny part is that most marketing people out there have no idea who anyone is because everyone is an expert as you correctly state.

Most social media projects are brain-dead simple, it's the creative that's difficult, and most social media experts aren't creative enough to come up with original campaigns.

There are great things ahead to come in the social media space, don't get me wrong. I'm not a hater, I am simply tired of the hype and the lack of original thought prevalent in this particular small corner of the marketing universe.

Larry Irons · 6 months ago

Social media is not simply marketing since it impacts all functional lines of business. If anything it is simply part of customer experience management.

Larry Irons · 6 months ago

Nice post Brian.

I especially appreciated the point about doing a little online fieldwork and listening, listening, listening before uttering anything to online communities. I also agree with the following quote: "Humanizing the brand is necessary, if and only if, a human voice will reduce or eliminate potential friction between the customer and the company." I can't imagine any benefit my health insurance provider's "brand" would gain from speaking to me in a human voice.

If you don't want your customers to readily learn your business processes and the way they work a human voice won't gain you much as a brand. It will likely increase rather than decrease friction. Perhaps part of becoming a social media authority is to know when not to use social media.

Kelly Rusk · 6 months ago

This is definitely a well thought out and accurate post, but I'm just sick of hearing people complain about 'social media experts'

The problem is not the experts in the broad sense of the meaning, it's these ridiculous people going around touting themselves as experts.

The way I see it... There's nothing wrong if others are calling you an expert. Now, If you have to call *yourself* an expert, you're probably not. Especially in the social media landscape where influence rules.

Will Robinson · 6 months ago

I find it interesting that you would post this right after a lengthy post on the 140 Character Conference. Is that a coincidence? Spending $1,000 to learn about twitter and be around twitter celebrities seems pretty close to what you're describing here. Was it worth it?

I wholeheartedly agree with you. I'm equally fatigued by the get rich quick schemes that continuously pop up on twitter. Tobias Bowman of highposition.net just posted on my blog that you "get out what you put in to social media." (http://www.socialherder.com/blog) That's all a company needs to understand. It's not rocket science.

As far as convincing an executive to use social media, that will only come with trust and a deep understanding of their needs, goals and business model. I think a lot of "experts" struggle with that absolutely necessary insight. I personally take more pleasure in figuring out why a client shouldn't be on twitter than why they should.

For a business, it's all about ROI. It's hard to measure reputation (which can be affected by a social media campaign) and returns tied directly to that. A good executive understands the dilemma and tries it out anyway. An important key is mitigating their risk in the form of cost (keep it low) and time spent on SM (rather than more traditional avenues). Social media experts do the industry a disservice when they keep both unnecessarily high for their own benefit.

Stuart Foster · 6 months ago

Essentially what it comes down to is this: We need to speak each others language in order to be effective. Just because you are proficient at one medium doesn't make you an expert by any means. In fact, it might make you less of one. It comes down to a willingness to adapt, shift and learn by admitting you don't know where this is going...but you are going to do your best to learn everything possible to turn it into an advantage for your company. I view you as an authority on PR and Social Media because I usually learn something from every post I read here. What's your litmus test?

marc meyer · 6 months ago

Brian, I would also venture that although the social media expert can be worrisome, there are a few others that we need to be concerned with as well. There is the person who has the green light to initiate social media within their organization but has no experience and actually can hurt the company more than the expert might. Or what about the marketing company or person who may handle one aspect of marketing for an org., and when asked if they can handle a social media project, they say that they can, but have no experience or authority or right in doing so. Again, another aspect where not having an expert can still have the same effect.

So it's not just having the person who claims to be an expert or authority that can be the problem, its the person who might be tasked with social media because of faint knowledge, the person who claims knowledge and the person who has no business engaging in social media/marketing- that can set an org back just as much as if they had an "expert" too.

We need people to just step up and say either I'm learning, we're learning or I don't know. Companies can't afford for people, experts, authorities or otherwise to learn social media at their expense..

Pat Strader · 6 months ago

Great post -

"We need to spend more time listening and less time broadcasting or talking “at” people."

Listening is the crux, yet the most ignored in implementation.

Philip Sheldrake · 6 months ago

Brian, thanks for your eloquence.

I'm a Chartered Engineer. That means I don't fix your washing machine (although I'll have a go!). It means I'm recognised as having attained the qualifications, the experience and the peer recognition of being a darn good professional engineer. CEng features on my business card.

I consult on social media or, more precisely, how to influence and be influenced. And there the accreditation stops. I can only strive to accrue reputation in this regard via blogging, word of mouth and running the marcomprofessional.com website (to which you syndicate of course). But as long as buyers remain poor at procuring social media expertise, the market for the charlatans, as you refer to them, stays buoyant.

My own stab at trying to expose the snake oil merchants without looking bitchy (an objective you accomplish very well) is a post titled "There is no such thing as a Twitter strategy" which in some way parallels your highlighting the "50 sites you MUST be on" approach to social media.

http://tinyurl.com/nosuchthing

Perhaps we need to write "The guide to procuring social media expertise for those who've never kept a blog, don't 'get' Twitter and still print off their emails"? :-)

varaba · 6 months ago

Brian, you are a constant source of inspiration and thought provocation! It never ceases to amaze me that your chosen words often reflect the truth and insight that most people are afraid to utter. Thank you!

Clau · 6 months ago

I have to agree, there has to be a distinction between the so called "social media experts" and real professionals doing a communication/PR and/or advertising strategy accordingly to each case. Its not a magical recipe where you open a twitter or Facebook account. There needs to be strategic planning behind it. A so called social media expert might be great understanding the tool, but the tool is just a tool until someone comes along and actually makes it useful.

jay social media · 6 months ago

This is really the truth about what is happening in our time. The web is saturated with pretenders.

Citterman · 6 months ago

The reputation of an expert, like a cult wine, is earned not bestowed. It is dangerous to the reputation of Social Media (and PR/Advertising, etc.) to represent oneself as something they are not. I see the seminars for Social Media education, review the presenter’s bio and truly wonder, besides chutzpah, what “expertise” are they pulling from. I think a grand dose of modesty is in order. We all want to learn, but not all of us should be teaching.

Sarah · 6 months ago

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that I have really liked browsing your blog posts. Anyway
I'll be subscribing to your feed and I hope you write again soon!

RavenGeordie · 6 months ago

One of the best articles I've read this year. You hit the nail right on the head with this one.

patrick1rooney · 6 months ago

Terrific commentary on the need to move from social media for the sake of social media to applying social media to drive tangible, meaningful results. True mastery is displayed by the ability to apply knowledge in a way that makes sense, and by being facile enough to take the "right" elements from the toolbox.

Nicely written.

@ghostlikeswayze · 6 months ago

Really enjoyed the article. I am completely overwhelmed by the amount of self-proclaimed social media experts that are out there that seem like they are trying to force "knowledge" on people. Thanks for putting in into perspective.

eventi · 6 months ago

it was more than 140 characters, so I skimmed....

Who do you think is doing it well? Who /is/ the real authority?

Derek Showerman · 6 months ago

Great read. I recently read a book that talks about your own personal brand and striving to be successful. http://www.bustingloosefromthebusinessgame.com I hope you like it.

Steve · 5 months ago

Wow, insightful post. I think the people at AdWido know this kind of thing relatively well.

briansolis · 21 hours ago

Interesting update to the discussion: http://mashable.com/2009/12/27/social-media-exp...