Social Media Experts: Real Experts or Complete Frauds?

I firmly believe that Social Media "Experts" are quite like psychics. People either believe what they do and say, or they think it's all a load of crap.

Needless to say, I'm skeptical of these self-proclaimed "experts" and here's why: (generally speaking) what have these "experts" done in the world of social media other than gather 10,376 Twitter followers and collect 23,432 friends and start 21.5 fan pages on Facebook? And with all their social media expertise and knowledge, they may have even figured out how to connect them, so when they Tweet, their Facebook status updates. Neat-O!

Maybe these "experts" stay connected to friends and contacts with their SmartPhones using Loopt or FourSquare while blogging about the rules of social media and filming YouTube videos of their child mashing chocolate birthday cake into a mushy paste which soon likens to a primitive cave drawing or facial war paint, while some sort of banal top 40's pop song plays in the background. (NOTE: This brings up the notion of what people now call 'multi-tasking', and which is something I will save for another time/post)

Perhaps they're "experts" because they've been on-board with social media since they had that Friendster profile "ages ago" or they lay claim to being the first person to send an informative and purposeful Tweet. (They're not, I did it first.)

If that's the case, if that's all it takes to be a social media expert...my 6 year-old mentally handicapped cousin and my 87 year-old luddite-turned-tech-junky grandmother have the same resume as any social media "expert" out there and everyone over the age of 8, who uses the internet and has at least two social media platform accounts, should be allowed to claim "Social Media Expert" on their resume. Hell, you may as well add a "social media expert" degree to the long list of at-home-degrees which Sally Struthers used to pimp on daytime TV.

Now, I know what you're thinking, "If this job is so easy, if so little brain activity and knowledge are involved, why aren't you doing it?" It's a valid question and I'm happy to answer it.

For my career, I aspire to something more than the corporate marketing equivalent of scratching my own ass. Personally, I don't want to spend any amount of time sitting in some office cubicle (or even at home) Tweeting about the untold virtues of Arm & Hammer's "Do-it-Yourself At Home Colonic" or Mr. Sticky's "All-Natural Peanut Butter" and uploading pictures of actual customers using these products to a Facebook Fan page.

I like to think that my knowledge of social media is only one of many skills which can be used to formulate an extensive and appropriate creative/marketing solution. And I personally believe that marketing yourself as a social media expert is about as useless as a degree in sanskrit; because as soon as this social media marketing trend blows over (and it will...something "better" will come along or people will just abandon the whole social media microcosm due to excessive sponsorship and corporate overload) you're going to be s*** out of luck and I, for one, don't really want to get laughed out of an interview because I have "Social Media Expert: 2008-2010" listed as a job on my resume.

Now with all that said, I do believe that Social Media Experts exist. They aren't these brash, self-indulgent, quick-talking sales people who convince a Board of Marketing Directors full of old white dudes that they need some hip, in-the-know, surfer, brandishing their corporate banner, to ride the social media tsunami. No, it's the inventors of social media themselves. It's people like Jonathan Abrams (creator of Friendster), Mark Zuckerburg (creator of Facebook) or the creators of FourSquare, Twitter, Amplify, YouTube or any other software platform that allows people to connect, network, stay in-touch, and communicate online and in the digital realm.

These are your social media experts! The inventors, the creators...the rest of us are just users, grateful users, but users. And while users can manipulate these social media behemoths and even use them in new and creative ways (because the true experts were gracious enough to bestow upon us gifts like open APIs), I just don't believe that makes them experts.

SM Performance Reviews: continued thoughts

I just posted some thoughts and an article about Social Media Performance Reviews over on Amplify, and in the fifteen minutes that have passed I've given this some more thought.

I think informal peer reviews through social media platforms is a good idea, but I also think this could be taken a step further when it comes to brands and advertising. There are plenty of brands out there involved in social media circles. It helps them get a pulse on what consumers are saying about their brand as well as allowing them to connect with their customers on another level. But it all happens after the fact.

How many times have you seen a commercial or campaign from a brand you like and say to yourself, "What was **** was that?" or perhaps you felt like it just doesn't speak to you. Maybe you hop online and Tweet or blog about it claiming "epic fail" by said company. If there is enough negative feedback on it, the company may take that into consideration for follow up campaigns and future advertising.

Now, what happens if our loved company had an internal review process in which you, the consumer, had more of a say? Would that be a whole lot different than a user-generated campaign?

Think about Threadless.com. People make designs, the community votes on it and the winning design gets produced. It's a pretty simple strategy that gets more people involved in the decision making process and it's a wonder to me that more ad firms aren't following a similar strategy.

If an advertising firm allowed their creatives to continue to create, but instead of an internal review by just their creative directors, the review is conducted by a brand community made up of the demographic you're trying to reach...isn't that ad firm going to be a lot closer to hitting the nail on the head when they launch a campaign?

Think of it as a focus group, but with a much broader and wider assortment of input.

In other words, getting feedback and input first would more than likely better the final product (as it relates directly to the consumer)...instead of getting feedback after the product has already hit the market.

There are a lot of loose ends in this theory of mine which I would need more time to think through, and I am quite certain will get pointed out if any commenting goes on here, but if there was a User-Generated Advertising Agency (of sorts)...talk about connecting with your customers, huh?

Common Knowledge, Not So Common in Social Media

When it comes to social media, does common knowledge just get thrown out the window? Is that why so many writers are able to publish articles about social media tips, hints, tricks and etiquette.

I feel like I see new articles on this stuff at least daily, and for the most part, they're all saying the same things: don't announce you're on vacation, remember everyone can see your Tweets, don't talk bad about colleagues, the list goes on and on, but it all seems like basic common knowledge stuff.

We all know that saying, "Common knowledge isn't so common," still, I'm surprised some of these people are probably getting paid to write some if this stuff. Comedians point out shortcomings in common knowledge, but at least they're funny.

That said, who are these people to tell me what the rules and regulations of social media should be? That my Tweets should incorporate more intellectual value than how many times a day I masticate or drink a cup of coffee. Isn't one point of social media that we, the society, get to determine what's good and bad...not some group of self-elevated, morally superior, elitists who have a bigger loudspeaker just because they're published writers, or so-called "experts" in the field.

I do agree that different platforms call for different protocol, but if you have to be told what those protocol are...perhaps you shouldn't be there in the first place. Let'em dig their own grave.

So, if you want to Tweet about a great burger you had, or update your Facebook status to, "Damn, that girl is peepin' my junk." Go ahead and do it! You're human and you've got personality...perhaps no class, but certainly personality. It might make some people judge you a little differently...but more than likely, they'll blow it off as just another stupid post.

As social media becomes more and more valid as a form of mainstream internet technology and not just "a way to stay in touch" you do lose some of the fun. It's almost like mom and dad just crashed your slumber party, so it would behoove you to remember that a lot companies and people are now using your online presence as a flagstick by which your character will be judged. But ultimately, how you conduct yourself online is your call, and that's all I'm going to say about it.