Social Media Marketing – Do We Have a Responsibility for How We Use It?
May 21, 2009 by admin1
Filed under internet marketing, Social Media Marketing, Welcome
I recently read this blog post by Chris Brogan where he talks about marketing from the point of view of the “everyman” or Word of Mouth Marketing
“The reason that people send me products is that I’m the new “everyman.” I’m the point-of-view character who just messes with your thing, or reads your book, or makes a goofy video, and shares with people what I think might be interesting to my audience. It’s that last part that matters the most, though. You knew that.”
Does this kind of marketing work? Yes, of course it does, right now, but will it continue to work? Only if we accept our responsibility for honesty and authenticity. Polls show that people only believe 20-30% of what they hear or see (and I think those figures are too high) in ads on TV.
Social Media holds the key to the future of a successful marketing campaign based on developing a relationship with an audience and then entering into a useful and truthful dialog about a product or service.
If we accept our responsibility and continue to give relevant and useful information without the usual marketing hype this type of marketing will continue to work. But, if we alter our primary objective and begin to travel down the road of traditional marketing, the world will become cynical about this just like every other form of promotion and we will shoot ourselves in the foot.
As Chris states at the end of his post
“Is it effective? I say yes, but ONLY if there is trust and transparency involved in the process. If people aren’t disclosing the relationships up front, and not respecting their community, I can see this failing fast. It’s up to us, but then, isn’t that the beauty of this new world? It’s always up to us.”
What do You think?
