Visualizing Social Media Part 2

Posted on August 13, 2008 by marc meyer

I had such a good time with the visualization of what we all do, what we evangelize, what we learn and what we share on a day to day basis that it seemed like a good idea to show you a few more graphical representations of the space:

Here is Deborah Schultz’s version of the social media ecosytem

Then there is Fred Cavazza’s Social Media Landscape

Next is Deirdre Breakenridge I know its tough to see, but it was a huge file.

Or perhaps you can relate to this?

Although, I always like David Armano’s visuals.

Which ones make sense to you? What should be obvious is the interconnectivity of every diagram up there, with the exception of the web 2.0 diagram of all the social media apps currently out there. Where do you fit in? Where do you see yourself in any of these? Are you a watcher? A participator? Do you contribute?

The Conversation As Transaction

Posted on August 11, 2008 by marc meyer

I recently read a post titled The social media expert, Who is he? in which Jacob Morgan espoused on the question we all have been asking each other as of late and that is, just who is the social media expert? But an interesting thing happend while reading some of the responses to Jacob’s post, someone wrote that the conversation, or that the interaction on social networks, could end up being monetized or transactional.

I’m not sure how it went from talking about social media experts to dovetailing into monetizing social networks but it certainly gave me pause to ponder whether social networks could find that happy place and actually make money beyond relying on traffic and Ad dollars.

But herin I came up with some questions that not only do social media startups need to ask themselves, but even ourselves as users and readers and participators need to ask.

If you are the architect of a social media app or community, are your goals and aspirations purely altruisitc? Or do you want to make money? Your success does depend on the community, which of course is predicated on what? the quality of your apps? or the quality of your participants and the interaction of those individuals?

Its not the platform or is it?

The easier you make it for people to interact, then the better your chances are to succeed? Right? So then it is about the platform. See the catch-22? What comes first the people or the platform? or rather what drives or determines the success? The quality of the platform of the passion of the people? Or is it sales and marketing and $30 million in funding?

So this made me think that could the conversation, could a conversation be monetized? Could there be a conversational transaction? Monetizing the conversation. Putting a value on the conversation above and beyond it’s intrinsic value? Is that possible? would we go for it?

Robin Carey brings up a great point in her response to the above blog post in which she says:

I think there is a world of hurt out there around the notion of “monetization,” or “transaction” and social media. Personally, I think the hurt is misplaced. Let’s face it, people do need to get paid for their intellectual endeavors, whether that is for designing a great app or moderating a productive conversation. If you think of social media as an online, 24/7 conference, then if there is value to be had in that conference, then people are willing to pay for it. I would venture that relationships do have value, which can be monetized, but hopefully in a way that is acceptable to both parties (“transactions.”) The big change with social media is that these transactions and monetizations (if that is a word) take place in a more transparent and inter-active fashion.

So essentially what it may boil down to, is that social networks will no longer be free? Or perhaps you have to pay for your widgets, pay to communicate with your peers? Not likely. Which means this steers us right back to the value of the conversation, or the transactional value of the conversation. Yes it’s valuable but only between the people that it concerns. Above and beyond that it has zero value. And lets be honest, has anyone tried to attach value to a conversation? Beyond its personal value to you and I? I guess that means, for now, we’re back to relying on traffic and ad revenue. For now.

I guess the last question would be then: If Twitter started charging, would you use it?

Why online communities fail

Posted on July 30, 2008 by marc meyer

“What we’ve got here is…failure to communicate.” — spoken by “The Captain”, the imperious prison warden played by Strother Martin in the movie, “Cool Hand Luke”

We talk about how great social nets are and all of the great things it has to offer but here is the flip side to that coin, why do online social communities fail? Where is the disconnect? Here are some opinions on the matter from the blogosphere.

Here is a post in which Eric Zeman says that up to this point mobile social networking has been a big fat failure. I’ve blogged about this in the past and have basically said that the 2 issues that will slow this rush down will be lack of real estate on the hand held device and browser speed of course. What do you think? where do you fall?

Social networking 2008 Friend or Failure, did this guy get it right? To a degree he did. Of course we have this little ditty from the Wall Street Journal on why communities fail. which we did not really need to read to know why they fail. It’s the community people, its the people, people. It’s not the cash. People make communities work. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t call them communities.

John Furrier has an interesting take as well, in which he says that users want value not cheerleaders but that still doesn’t prevent him from saying that Social Media – Corporate Blogging – Most Failing? It has to be social.

Are you starting to see a trend here? As many supporters and champions of how great social nets are, there are still areas in which some if not many see shortcomings and potential for improvement in the model. Here are a few more. This one coming from the auto industry: Social Media Networks in the automotive industry are fledgling and the dynamics created inside of them is atypical of what you see in other niches.

Here’s a post from last summer, titled, Traditional marketing failing on social networks. Yes that still seems to be true though I am seeing some marketing gains in regards to companies putting the right people in place to handle new social media intiatives. But not at any acceptable levels.

What all of this is, is people looking at communities and saying they are failing, or they failed and then they start pointing fingers. Or they just count the reasons why they failed. Or maybe they are the ones, who have never participated? Bottom line should be, how do you prevent community failure in an online social network?

Here is a response from FreshNetworks in response to the Wall Street Journal article in which they are essentially saying, Branded online communities that are set up and managed correctly don’t fail. And I have to agree with them.

Here’s more on why online communities fail In a world saturated with solicitations where people have less and less attention available, most communities fail because they bypassed a few important questions, like “what are we offering users?”, “what is differentiating us from other communities?”,

And of course the online community numbers that don’t add up

Why do online communities fail? The biggest reason for failure is relying on technology – whether it’s websites, forums, Web 2.0, social media, social networks or any of the buzzwords. Too many businesses spend massive amounts of money on the technology rather than the plans and processes and people that are what make up a community. To a certain degree the technology might not fit but it’s technology that drives the process, so we have to rely on it.

The customer collective on why communities fail: The first reason is that many companies who embark on community initiatives are putting their company or product at the center of the effort. As many pointed out, that is obviously WRONG – you need to put the community member at the center and make sure that there is some passion around the initiative. Put the customer at the center, but the customer needs to know why they are there.

Three Reasons Branded Online Communities Fail Would you launch a new product or service line without an experienced person to develop and manage it? Not usually, no. The same goes for online communities.

Or perhaps, why online communities fail, Community is about community and community leaders, folks don’t be seduced by eye candy!

Why Does Corporate Social Networking Fail? Dave Allen weighs in at Social Media Today. And so does Jerry Bowles with Online Business Communities – Who’s Winning? Who’s Losing

In conclusion let’s remember the thing that people who have the cash to set these up seem to forget or overlook. It’s all about the community, the managers, the brand champions, the word of mouth people who love the site, the users who genuinely love to connect with people, it’s people who love the brand and the company, the people who would do anything for the company for the brand. Its the friendships made. Its about companies listening. Those are your community. NOT the marketers, and the tech people that built it. It’s the people that matter that contribute, and it’s the contributors that matter who matter most. What part of that do you not understand?

After reading your fair share, where do you think the burden of an online communities success should fall?

Does social media seduce us?

Posted on July 28, 2008 by marc meyer

So you meet someone. And there is something about that someone that enthralls you. Something that makes you want to spend hours with that person. Time becomes non-existent. Food-an afterthought. Your current friends and family wonder where you have been. Why? Because you have been, in this case, sucked into social networking and social media and it’s now become this mating dance of sorts.

So the questions, have you been seduced by social media? Does it seduce us? Sure It does. Admit it, you know you have been sucked in and seduced by its offerings of endless friendships and relationships with like minded people, its cool widgets, it’s offer of making things easier so you can connect with more people etc., etc. That’s right, Social media and the public are in love with each other right now. or better yet, are infatuated with each other. The result being, we, the users, are willing to to be fed whatever social media and it’s networks want to serve us right now. We’re willing to accept it because It’s fresh right now.

The relationship is fresh. We go out with each other and we have no complaints, or if we do, we overlook them for now. In fact, we tell others about our relationship with social media. We want others to see it, we want to share it. We want them to be a part of it.

Because Social Media is that bright shiny thing. That hot new boy toy. The smoking girl you met last week.

In fact social media can do no wrong right now because social media has a lot of siblings and a lot of connections and they all are very loving and friendly and willing to go out with you too. It’s like one big brothel!

The only thing you need to bring to the table is your personal information. All you have to give up is some tiny bits of personal information that should not take to long to give up and is really not that big a deal and you’ll be back doing your social media thing in no time etc etc. And based on the fact that it’s not that big a deal, you go ahead. And you forget it about it.

Problem is, the relationship may sour. or even already might be starting to sour. Most do, at least to the extent that 50% of all marriages fail. So why will this one be any different? You’re realizing that maybe it wasn’t as sexy and shiny and new as you thought. So now what?

You’ve just given yourself, all of yourself over to this relationship, and now it has soured. What do you do?

Hell it’s social media, just go join another one. Go find another social networking group. Think about it. A relationship ends, you mourn, you pick yourself up, you dust yourself off and you go and find another relationship to jump into. But now you’re wizer, you know better, you’ve learned from all of the previous relationships and now you know exactly what you are looking for. The question is. Who will be in charge of this relationship? You, or the other? Who’s calling the shots? Assuming that both have learned from their previous relationships, here are 11 things that both parties should be aware before entering into any new social media, social networking union.

Your next relationship with social media will be better than the previous one because of a few factors. 1) You know what you’re looking for 2) The relationship is based more on trust and understanding of each other 3) The relationship involves even more communication 4) You are available for each other all the time 5) There will never be a betrayal 6) Self improvement will be mutual 7) It will be important to share with others 8) Mutual Respect will be necessary 9) We promise to be the person we are, and not the person we wished to be 10) Our privacy will always be our privacy 11) My data is mine and not yours and when I want it back, I mean it I want it back. Don’t make me jump through a bunch of bullshit hoops to get it back either!

So in answer to my question. Yes, social media does seduce us. It always will, but fool me once shame on you, fool me twice and shame on me.

Stupid corporate social networking site #312

Posted on July 18, 2008 by marc meyer

This just in:

Cats Flocking to new social networking site!

In the category of “I have a great idea and I know management will go along with it”, we have the Purina Breeze cat litter social networking site. Courtesy of Marshall Kilpatrick over at ReadWriteWeb

Feel free to shoot me other examples of where Corporate America just did not get it right.

Searching for social media experts

Posted on July 15, 2008 by marc meyer

I just read an article in Adweek about Ford hiring Scott Monty in its quest to grapple with and implement the monolith that is… trumpets please… social media. While reading the piece I couldn’t help but wonder outloud just how social media experts became social media experts in a space so relatively fresh in our collective marketing, media and PR consciousness. Not that Scott is not one, but this thought came to me after reading that Ford ran 50 candidates through the gauntlet before choosing Scott.

Which begs my first of many questions: Though they chose a good person, who made the final decision, and what was it based upon? Who were the other 50 and why were they not chosen? I know that there is always a bit of subjectiveness to this process but I think, given the “newness” of the space, that it had to be absolutely fascinating to see how the whole thing went down. I do have to give some credit to Ford for stepping up, now more than ever, and especially given the state of the economy and the auto industry in particular. Somebody, somewhere, within that organization had the foresight to get to a decision maker and say, “we need to grab onto the beanstalk that is social media.

Some other questions I had and I’m sure other likeminded organizations are probabaly grappling with are:

Do we, they become expert like from writing it so much that we begin to understand how it works? Do experts, or are experts people who have implemented a or some social media campaigns of any scale, successfully or unsuccessfully? What is the criteria? Are they IT people? marketing experts? PR experts? What determines the experts title as the “expert”. Who determines it? Their peers? The nascent industry itself?

I do think that longevity in the space that is and has been marketing, PR and even IT/internet/marketing, certainly is a determining factor. Why? Well think about it, when we all got into the business of what we do, what we did then is certainly not what we do now. Our jobs, titles and positions have all evolved. They have morphed into what the public and our bosses have demanded, expected and required us to learn, on the fly. And currently for some of us, that is all things social media related.

With that being said, when I write about the top 30 social media evangelists, I write from a position of referring to these people time and time again about social media topics that are hot. I mention them because they have their fingers on the collective pulse of their clients, their usage of bleeding edge technology to leverage brands, and their willingness to share their experiences. I call them experts, because their names and their blogs come up in conversations, they are constantly pushing out valuable information, and they are essentially practicing what they are preaching. And I find myself going back to “them” because clients and what I do and we do on a day to day basis, requires that I learn fast and implement faster.

Funny thing though, even the experts are wondering who the real experts are!

And if you really want to know the truth. Social media has to be a “practice what you preach model”. Why? You can’t be successfull in the space by being quiet and stealthy. it’s all about the sharing and exchanging of information without pretense. That’s right, the conversation.

But to be successfull in the space, it is eventually going to boil down to those who do and those who did and not those who have heard and those who say.

All I do know is that the expert does not or should not call himself the expert. I can’t place the quote but:

Anyone who has to tell you that they are “the man”, ain’t “the man…”

Social Networks: The path you take is equal to the effort you make!

Posted on July 14, 2008 by marc meyer

So for shits and giggles the other day, I decided to do a search in LinkedIn for people with my name Marc Meyer. I think I found 13. I thought, in their infinite wisdom, that maybe they would appreciate linking to me. There was a teacher, a sales rep, another techy person, someone in real estate, and a fireman to name a few. I only got 2 people who agreed to do it, probabaly because they either a) got a little freaked out and thought it was a glitch in the LI system or b) don’t use LI that much or c) were worried about ID theft? d) did not appreciate the irony of linking to themselves…

Marc Meyer is now linked to Marc Meyer.

Odd to think that there are lots of “us” running around out there. But this thought led me to Google where I subsequently “Googled” my name and did a couple of searches on Reunion.com and PeopleFinders and came to find out that there are about 46 of my likenamed brethren running around. Before you say anything else, I guarantee that YOU have “Googled” yourself at least once. In fact, I am willing to bet that some of you have RSS feeds set up to notify you when your name is mentioned somewhere. Relax, it’s no big deal. I’ve done the former but not the latter.

Back to my point on why this is relevant?

I’ll tell you why. I have spoken on numerous occasions and in numerous blog posts and to numerous clients about what will happen in the social media space in the future. I have said that what you will see is the “nichefication” of the space. Where large social networks will splinter off into smaller distinct groups. It’s already happening, in fact if you look at the current number of networking groups within the social networking site of LinkedIn, you will see that there are currently roughly 24,000 distinct groups and counting! Thats smaller social networking groups within the environs of the larger ones.

What does this have to do with me and my 46 counterparts?

Well in theory, we all have something in common, in this case, my name. So in theory, it might be worth it to network with people who have my exact name. Maybe not, since I haven’t really thought through the whole identity theft thing. But what could a social networking group consisting of 46 people with the same exact name do? Maybe not much, but they do have something very in common and that is essentially how people are now coming together today, as we speak, in these groups. They find a common thread or link and they build upon it. Through these connections, things happen. Conversations are started and relationships occur. As I have said in the past, we all want to run with our pack, our brood, our peeps. There is a comfort level that is there with people of like minds and backgrounds, so what is more common a starting point than your name?

So do I contact the 46 Marc Meyer’s? Maybe not, since the undertaking, the leadership and the roll out of something like that would fall on my shoulders. Perhaps I could start something on NIng and see where it might end up. But the bottom line is this, and this is what you need to be thinking about going forward: You need or rather you should try and find the group that best fits you and what defines you rather than settling for the stadiums or oceans that are the current state of social networks.

So do you want to run with your own/ or be a part of this large melange of different kingdoms, phylums, classes, genus’s and species?

Or this?

And in the end
The love you take
Is equal to the love you make.

I had to rework the quote “In the end the love you take is equal to the love you make” which is essentially the Beatles closing statement. It is the last lyric on the last album they recorded. Let It Be. Though it is certainly not the last line or epitaph for social networks and all that they have to offer, it can certainly define the future for Social Networks. So yes, “and in the end, the path you take, is equal to the effort you make.” Now more than ever, you determine you.

16 random negative Twitter-pinions

Posted on June 23, 2008 by marc meyer

Ok so Twitter has been up as of late, so maybe the above cartoon is not as applicable. But something that is, are people’s opinions or their general “take” on Twitter. Want to see some of the more creative answers to the question, do you Twitter? Interesting insight to say the least.

-“Personally, I don’t see the need to follow anyone that closely nor for anyone to follow me that closely. Nor do I want it either way”

-“Marc, call me a troglodyte, but I see no allure to this.”

-“, I don’t give a twitter if someone is looking at olives on isle four third shelf up. 😉 ”

-“Big Brother, anyone?? ”

-“No, I am not interested in what you had for lunch, nor do I share such information with those following me.”

-“I’ve tried it. It could become a black hole that you never get out of. It can suck up your time.”

-“Maybe it will become the new texting once devices catch up with the tech.”

– It’s a question of establishing followers that I find the least attractive aspect of Twitter — if you don’t have followers, you can become sort of psychotic, always talking to yourself in a tiny room with no one to listen to your persistent updates. ”

-” It seems pointless and just another time waster and login you have to try and remember”

-“The internets biggest waste of time ever!”

-“If Twitter is as I understand it, I’m not clear on how it is that any user types anything other than “I’m typing on Twitter”.

-“Either I need enlightenment or Twitter users need lives. Maybe second lives?”

-“Seems voyeuristic or reminiscent of horror and stalker flicks!”

-“It’s a time suck”

-“God bless. to each his/her own, and other sundry platitudes to that effect. But for me, nope. ”

-“I don’t know if it will ever become mainstream. But it does remind me of the way my teenagers use text messaging now. ”

To each his own I guess. I find it interesting that there is such a strong negative opinion, but even more interesting is that some of them may have not ever used it, either. What is your opinion of Twitter? Obviously, even if you have not used it before, you seem to have one. Mad shout out to geek and poke btw.

The funnel theory with social networks

Posted on June 23, 2008 by marc meyer

Check out my man here. He’s heard a lot about social networks and he wants to check them out. He’s not sure why he should, he just knows that everyone is talking about them, they use them to meet people and they use to talk to friends and relatives and it is THE Thing to do! But where should he start. What social network is right for him? Should he do some research? If he does he’s going to find differing opinions from all over the place. He’ll hear about the notion that Linkedin is not Facebook for grownups

Or maybe he saw this video that parodies Facebook? And now he’s all WTF is Facebook about?

The bottom line is that when you decide to Join the online social community, this is what happens:

You are a lone individual that is joining a community of individuals. At that point, it is now up to you to join the conversation. But joining the conversation does not mean that you are, in theory “part” of the conversation. You could move your way up the social media spiral but that would mean that you are doing a majority, or want to do a majority of the below stages of the spiral:

But you don’t need to. You just want to know what it all means and where you fit in. You just want to know, what exactly is a social network? Let’s segue to our friends from Common Craft shall we?

Ok so now you have an idea but what should you do now? Maybe, just maybe you could jump into a social network, but do you even know which one? Here is a quick primer of two of the more popular social networking sites. Honestly though, if I’m explaining this, you have to be living in a freakin cave. But I digress..

If you’re going to use Facebook then you need to know that it has more than 60 million active users, an average of 250,000 new registrations per day since Jan. 2007 and over 55,000 regional, work-related, collegiate, and high school networks. More than half of Facebook users are outside of college and the fastest growing demographic is those 25 years old and older. Is that too large for you?

If your cup of tea might be MySpace maybe you should know that it has more than 110 million monthly active users around the globe, however, 85% of MySpace users are of voting age (18 or older) One in four Americans is on MySpace. MySpace is translated in more than 20 international territories: U.S., UK, Japan, Australia, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Mexico, Canada, Netherlands, New Zealand, MySpace en Espanol, Latin America, Austria, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland.

But thats just 2 of the big ones that I’m sure you have heard about. Here is a nice breakdown of the top social sites provided by compete

In the end, you should check out each one and see if it fits the criteria you want in your selection of a social network. It will be up to you to decide which one fits you the best. Because in reality, this is how the social networking funnel should look:

Ultimately, and you will see, if not already, that the best way to thrive in a social networking setting is to be amongst people that are of like mind and spirit. Thats why if you are in your mid 30’s and love reading books and are more concerned about what is in your 401k, maybe MySpace ain’t the ticket. Eventually we will all have our own sense of where we should be within a social network, it’s merely up to you to find your way and craft, meld and shape your online indentity in the social network that makes sense to YOU.

17 social media influencers and thought shapers

Posted on June 17, 2008 by marc meyer

Butch Cassidy: “I couldn’t do that. Could you do that? Why can they do it? Who are those guys?”

I promised that I would follow up the top 30 social media experts post I did with a few more people who’s work I admire, who’s thinking is forward, and who’s ideas of what culture and technology should be, are wide open. You have no idea how many bookmarks and sites I have saved that I try to read and digest and actually think about. No wonder my eyes are always bleeding on the way home from work? Easy..I’m kidding..

It’s these types of people that will provide the basis of how we will view our interactions in a technological environment as we go forward. If you are unfamiliar with some of these people, that’s ok. Pretty soon you won’t be. Of these 17, feel free to offer up your peers for review. We currently have a listing of 51 social media experts, luminaries and standouts! I’d love to add more and I know they’re out there. Beware though, if you email or tweet that you’re an expert, then you’re not.

I would suggest setting aside some time to really go through the list, as there is quite a bit to digest here, but it’s all good and so so very relevant today!