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Social Media Marketing can be an enormous opportunity for businesses and marketers, but it tends to get a bad rap these days. Though it’s working daily on all the sites we depend on, companies wonder who should be taking care of it, the internet literati complain about clutter, and everyone else scrambles to figure out how to use it carefully without getting left in the dust.
There are some good reasons for skepticism when it comes to Social Media Marketing: as a new field, no one agrees on the rules, let alone what makes an expert. A few things, however, are clear:
- Social Media is how people interact with each other and the world, so Social Media Marketing is inevitable. It’s here to stay – the only thing left to argue about is how you and your company will engage with it.
- The stakes are up. Used to unprecedented levels of control and customization, Facebookers and Twitterers feel proprietary about their virtual spaces and think that news or opinions should only be on their feed or home page if they’ve authorized their presence. Unwelcome intrusions or annoyances don’t just hit the recycle bin – they can start a backlash. Of course, on the flip side, a really good campaign can move farther and faster than ever before!
- It’s not easy. This is clear in the complaints about clutter and the proliferation of self-pronounced “Social Media Experts.” Doing it right requires expertise in both Social Media technologies and Marketing principles.
- It’s a big world. There are so many users making noise that it can be hard to figure out which ones are worth listening to – and so many ears listening that it is even harder to figure out which ones to speak to. This is where old-fashioned marketing expertise comes in; if you’re serious about putting your voice in, it’s worth getting a little help in figuring out where your people are and what can make you credible to them. Understanding audience and knowing what matters to them might require a little more experience and broader marketing knowledge than your average “Social Media Expert” with a MyFace page and 7,943 “friends,” but it can make all the difference between you having 3,874 “friends” and gaining 582 valuable new customers.
We’ve been working with Twitter, Facebook, and others…how have you been using social media, and what do you think makes someone expert at it?
Paul Dunay from Marketing Profs asked the question “How Long Does It Take to Become a Social Media Expert?” In his example borrowed from Macolm Gladwell’s book The Outliers, the sobriquet “expert” happens with mastery of a skill and 10,000 hours of practice (an unusually quantitative definition). Paul uses the example of a master violinist and breaks down the rigorous schedule of 40 to 80 hour work weeks required to earn mastery: so for social media it would take years.
But what happens when your profession (the skill of trade) only exists for 6 to 18 months at a time? What happens when the speed of technological evolution and ‘cultural acceptance’ accelerates past the expected qualifications of mastery?
Barry Hurd wrote: “I think this question does have a valid point: there are a lot of self-appointed “Social Media Experts” out there that have no real valuation as an expert. You also have to inquire about several more aspects to properly define your question. Social Media is not exactly new, in fact parts of the social media ecology have been around for decades.
The terms for social media have changed substantially over the years:
Social Media or New Media or Blogging or Chat Rooms or Web/ Online Forums or Bulletin Board Systems…
The acceptance of social media as a catch-phrase has clouded the way many people view the marketplace. In a world where the terminology and technology changes every 180 days, no one could really claim to be an expert in any of these classifications. They simply don’t exist long enough.
Social Media is also hundreds of interconnecting technologies and trends. If we use the violinist example- a violin would be Facebook. Social Media would be the entire orchestra set: including audience arrangement, event planning, dozens of instrument skills, evening promotion, singing, and valet parking lot administration.
Just like the Orchestra: any one single instrument may take center stage but it is more likely accompanied by a dozen others. Fortunately for music: talent is timeless.”
Thanks for the marketing tips. They were very helpful!