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Nov 19, 2009
Are You Confused About What Social Media Means?
Social Media. Stop the Confusion.
I got some flack yesterday about my post introducing the forthcoming series, “Social Media Made Simple” I am sharing with the WealthNet community of entrepreneurs. An old friend in the PR world suggested that there’s nothing simple about social media. My reply is I am offering educational content (for free) to make it simple to get started with social media and networking.
I agree that there’s a lot to know and the most advanced people with social media have invested tons of time and energy to learn it. Yet there are millions of people who are just getting started. And that’s my goal. To make getting started simple. 1-2-3…
Whenever I speak or write about social media, internet marketing strategy or anything else, I try to communicate in a way that everyone can understand. The WealthNet community of entrepreneurs strives to help people from all walks of life start, fund, market and grow successful businesses, thereby creating wealth through entrepreneurship. So I try to keep my communications simple especially when it comes to technology and internet marketing.
So to start out with Social Media Made Simple I want to make sure we define what social media is really. (That’s pretty simple isn’t it?) Interactive media, social networking, forums, newsgroups, bulletin boards, blogs, micro blogs, Web 2.0, and so on can confuse the heck out of most people. So here we go.
For the purposes of this article, I reference how Wikipedia defines social media … “…designed to be disseminated through social interaction, created using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media uses Internet and web-based technologies to transform broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many). It supports the democratization of knowledge and information, transforming people from content consumers into content producers.”
Further, social media can be said to have three components;
- Concept (art, information, or meme).
- Media (physical, electronic, or verbal).
- Social interface (intimate direct, community engagement, social viral, electronic broadcast or syndication, or other physical media such as print).
Common forms of social media;
- Concepts, slogans, and statements with a high memory retention quotient, that excite others to repeat.
- Grass-Roots direct action information dissemination such as public speaking, installations, performance, and demonstrations.
- Electronic media with ‘sharing’, syndication, or search algorithm technologies (includes internet and mobile devices).
Read the full definition here.
When I speak and write about social media, my version is this. It’s about attraction and education-based relationship building. Period. The terms social media, social networking, Web 2.0, and interactive media can be considered to mean the same thing. At least that’s the way I look at it.
How do you define social media? What difference is it making in your life? What’s not working for you? We appreciate your comments.
Thanks. Clifford Jones
Social Media
Social media management.
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Since I am the PR friend you referenced, I figure I better chime in here. The thing about social media is that it is a very cost-efficient and dynamic way to communicate directly with your consumers. Whether you are a small retailer or a large multi-national corporation, social media has created the opportunity to engage, one-on-one, with the people that are seeing your brand.
But, it requires some strategic thought. Yes, it is simple to set up a blog or create a fan page on Facebook. They are free and very easy to do. But then what? What information are you going to share, how are you going to interact with your fans, when is the right time to post information, how often should you post?
It is called “social media” for a reason — you must engage with your fans, you must converse with them. In order to be successful in this space, it has to be more than simply putting up a page and pushing out information.
Cliff, I so appreciate that you are opening up the dialogue here. All businesses must know what is happening in the social media space — you are being talked about, whether you are managing it or not. So it is EXTREMELY important to understand what this new media is all about.
Great comments Abbie. We agree on your point. Social media is about building relationships over time. Taking a strategic view is important. For me and I think a lot of other people, it’s spending countless hours reading, learning and DOING this stuff that makes a difference in helping others do it. Apply to social media, internet marketing and other aspects of building a business the Strategy Learning Cycle that Keith McFarland reveals in The Breakthrough Company. After all it’s a proven methodology. See. Decide. Do. Learn. Repeat. Now if more people would just be more courteous in their social networking efforts. I won’t hold my breath. And it’s forcing me to be a lot more focused in my social networking efforts.