Social Media is the current flavour of the month. Twitter and Facebook have gone mainstream. Marketeers are chattering about their next social media campaign. Businesses are jumping into it with gay abandon, expecting to see sales rocket. But the backlash is coming, and here's why...
1) A one day course in how to use social media does not make you an expert, in fact it is often worse than nothing, and the resulting efforts are superficial and underdeveloped.
2) Social media is being driven by techies. It HAS to be seen as marketing. Techies are great with code and programming, but they are not marketeers.
3) But...you also need to be able to translate the marketing thinking for the tech guys. Knowing how to load up a photograph on Facebook or Twitter is not making the most of the available tools.
4) Social media does not make bad marketeers good marketeers. There are really talented and creative people in some marketing departments, and there are some that don't know their ear from their elbow. The on line world has not changed that one single little bit.
5) Social media does not make people creative, better writers, able to produce good video content, or to distinguish a good, engaging idea from a bad one.
6) Social media needs care and attention. It is not a cactus that needs watering once a year, it needs to be tended daily. There are many that have started on Facebook and Twitter that will get distracted, think that it is not producing results, and let it whither on the vine.
7) On size does not fit all. Campaigns need planning, and delivery, with a target audience, strategy, set outcomes and measurement. It is not about the number of followers. It is about the brand relationship that leads to sales.
8) People will get bored. There. I said it. And unless there is real effort to keep them engaged, then they will move on.
9) There are people out there waiting for the demise of social media. They want it to fail. Why? Because there are people that are just like that. The pessimists that get a real pleasure from being Cassandra like in their predictions.
10) All of the above will result in press coverage, comment and on going news about how companies are not getting the return on investment, or on the time spent, and how social media was a fad. It isn't, but those that succeed will be the companies that take it seriously and invest time, effort, and money in getting it right...