Great piece on social media in practice
If you’re tired of reading books about social media theories, here’s a great article on social media practices and the need to go where your customers are: “You Can’t Stop Them From Talking” by David Bowen.
It walks you through several social media technologies, provides advice on each, and then gives several real-world examples of how brand name companies are embracing (or fighting) social media, with some great points on what to copy and what to avoid.
Some key snippets:
The idea is simply that the internet can be used not only as a vertical communication medium, with organisations transmitting to an audience, but also a horizontal one, where the audience members talk to each other. It is not a new idea: bulletin boards and newsgroups pre-date the web, while online forums have had niche success for years.
Although social networking sites and ideas are held together by shared ideas, it makes little sense for businesses to think of them as one. Even similar technologies can be put to very different uses, which is why it makes better sense to consider them according to the ways in which they can help (or hinder) business activities.
… companies need to consider two more or less distinct online terrains. The home turf, including their own web estate and blogs, which they can control directly. And the “extended web”, the scary area of blogs, social network sites, wikis and the like where they and their products may be talked about, abused or praised, but on which they can have only an indirect influence.
October 2nd, 2007 at 4:46 PM
I agree with some of the comments in the article that said things such as, “Don’t think of it in a tactical way – what should we do on Facebook? Should we have a blog?”
Company Web sites will always be the information authority. Blogs should be used only when there is something new or exciting about a person or product within the company.
Blogs should be used as part of a larger movement to the Web, not just a tactic that a company does because everyone else it doing it.
I liked this article. I think it touched on a lot of points that people who are interested in social media may miss because it is fairly new.
Thanks for posting it!
October 8th, 2007 at 6:49 AM
I agree – great summary and hopefully the FT will be reaching out to decision makers who can actually implement some of these tactics that their junior teams keep talking about.
Yet I’d have liked the article to have included some of the tools that he talked about . . . the opportunity to blog back etc
January 28th, 2008 at 3:24 PM
What a great article. The issues discussed are applicable for independent business people as well.
I am an expert in the specialized area of vocal coaching and ancient healing and transformational music, and would like to use social networking as a way to build up this field.
Any suggestions would be very much appreciated.
January 28th, 2008 at 3:46 PM
The key is to go where your audience is rather than focus on a specific social network. So I’d talk to some of your customers (or would be customers) and find out where they go for information — YouTube, MySpace, etc.