Social Myths

Social media companies and marketers are obsessed with numbers.  Gross numbers.  Facebook with 500m+ users.  LinkedIn about to do an IPO with 90m users, $10m in profits, and a valuation of ‘whoa’.  And brands are getting obsessed with numbers too:  how many ‘like’ them.  Running promotions to get lots of ‘likes’.  The more the merrier.  As if having 1000’s of followers makes them some sort of guru.  Looks good when you talk to the CEO and discuss the ‘legions of fans we have’.  Even if many were ‘bought’ with a short term promotion.  And even if their plan for engagement is a series of push promotions, deals, specials … and not much else.

So we think it’s time to have a gut check on what seems to be happening in this space.  Here are a few myths that need imploding:

Myth #1:  Having lots of followers is a ‘good thing’.

Fact is having lots of followers who genuinely sought you out, and were not induced to become a fan, is better.  Work we used to do in the UK for a major cable operator is an interesting parallel:  customers who called the ‘inbound’ hotline to sign up stayed a lot longer (i.e. lower churn) than those who were cold called or nabbed on the doorstep by an aggressive salesperson.  Frankly hitting the ‘like’ button is such a low barrier to action that can you really call them ‘fans’? Certainly not in any active sense. Also, whilst you might be happy to like Starbucks or Skittles who’s really going to like Clorox?

Myth #2:  Followers need to have a big voice in marketing strategy

We know that many brands are ‘listening’ and responding to their ‘fans’.  But surely the ones you’re trying to influence and acquire are unlikely to be fans.  While understanding the motivations and beliefs of brand ‘lovers’ is important, so equally is gaining insights on those who don’t choose your brand.  Don’t ignore this group – invariably they’re the ones who your outbound marketing is targeting, the ones who you are trying to convince to sign up, or give you higher share of wallet, or whatever you’re pushing.  And guess what:  they’re not on your fan page, they don’t ‘like’ you.

Myth #3:  Positive comments outweigh negative comments = all is good

Most marketers tend to follow the old song by Johnny Mercer:  “Accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative”.  But sometimes listening to what you don’t want to hear can teach you more about where you need to improve.  And sometimes listening to detractors is vital … especially if they have lots of followers themselves!  The old adage of a negative customer experience will result in 6-8 other people hearing the story is completely blown out of the water in the ‘social age’:  try 600-8000 other people, depending on the influence of the person.  Identify your biggest detractors, the true ‘pests’ of your brand, and DEAL WITH THEM.  You might be surprised at the positive benefits.  A good example:  United Breaks Guitars – guy whose guitar United Airlines wrecked who posted it on YouTube with a song. Over a million people saw it.  So instead of responding with a replacement guitar (perhaps in exchange for a positive song), they allow it to fester and more people to hear about the story.

Myth #4:  22 Year Old Graduates are Geniuses at Social Media

Marketers are enamored with the culture of youth where it comes to newer tools, and social media is no exception.  Countless brands seem to think the solution to make up for their internal lack of experience and understanding is to plug into Gen Y.  After all, a Gen Y invented some of these social media tools.  Now I’m not going to pooh pooh an entire generation, and I’m sure there are a load of twenty-somethings with plenty of knowledge to share.  But the point is, ageism doesn’t belong in a strategy discussion – any more than a marketer would insist on hiring a fifty something for doing ‘old media’ like newspaper or TV ads.  Fact is anyone can learn, grow, and increase in their effectiveness in working in the social media space.  Experience, trial and error, content obsession:  all are the true sources for developing social media competence.  Hiring someone who is a ‘digital native’, who grew up ‘speaking the language’, will almost certainly find it harder to understand why others (i.e. their bosses) who are having to learn this new language might see things differently.  And the other fact is, despite the number of self-proclaimed experts, the true experts understand that this is a rapidly evolving and changing beast, with something new or different coming out daily (or hourly!).  In short, there are no experts – just some people with new or different experiences to share.  Find those, and forget how old they need to be!

Myth #5 Lots of people will talk about your brand on social media

If you’re the Yankees, Inception or Justin Bieber you will get talked about. If you’re a destination brand like Starbucks or Ikea you might get talked about. But for the other 99% of brands, people generally have more pressing topics of conversation. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be in social media, just that most brands need to reframe their objectives (and their metrics!). For example, check out the Pepsi Facebook wall. They have over 3 million fans and try very hard to post stuff that starts conversations. Most of the threads have less than 100 comments. The recent exception is one with more than 2000 comments. And guess what:  it’s about the Super Bowl and all the comments are pro- or anti- Steelers and Packers.

What myths do you think need tackling?