Kill The Messenger, Not The Message

The social marketing tsunami continues to roll.  You can barely open a newspaper, blog, or start a conversation without the words Facebook or Twitter coming up. The allure of creating “true” one-to-one relationships with strangers is seductive.  At the personal level, it is at once exhilarating and yet a little scary. For the marketer, it is only exhilarating. For the first time, marketers have the ability to effortlessly reach out and touch customers and prospects with completely personalized messages.  What’s more, it is basically free. Nirvana.

But wait. Doesn’t this sound familiar?  Fifteen years ago, many of the same things were being said about the first generation Internet.  All we needed to do then, was hang out our virtual shingle and “they would come.”  The frenzy to get online was not unlike today’s frenzy to get on Facebook and Twitter. But what happened?  Well, soon everyone was online and there were too many sites to visit, there was too much marketing noise, and marketers found themselves back at square one. That is the same thing that is happening today with Web 2.0.

On the other hand, there are many companies who successfully used Web 1.0 and are now using Web 2.0 technologies to do real business. What’s the secret?  Here are some take-aways.

·         Social media are a set of technologies. Technologies are always a means, not an “end.”  Too many people are in the socio-sphere without a marketing strategy. Case in point – how many tweets and Facebook updates have you gotten recently shamelessly pushing products or services?  The folks posting these updates belong to the Viagara “email school of marketing.”  Honestly, do people really think that anyone will react to this?

·         It all starts with the message. Social media offer channels to communicate with a community, but the message must be sincere and provide value to both parties. Hey, I don’t want to someone ringing my doorbell in the offline world, I sure as heck don’t want them doing it in the online world  If you want to be my friend online, connect with me. This works well for things like hobbies and for causes I really care about.  It doesn’t work for many products and services – for those folks….I say, stay away.

·         A robust marketing program must include subtle touch points as well. If people trust the messenger, the message gets through a lot better. For example, many companies have successfully created blogs that provide objective information to their constituents.  Post shouldn’t be measured for lead generation.  Creating a place where people come to rely on you for valuable information is a good thing. Credibility and sincerity translate help you cut through the noise when it counts.

Bottom line.   I say, “let the message talk and the messenger walk.”