COMMENTS
Of course people get caught up in they hype - that's what hype is. But I disagree with a few of your points. I do believe that social media can not only make your company more interesting but it can also make companies happier.
Social media provide a great platform to tell stories, which can then open up doors and windows into your company that were never available before. Plus, my my own experience, I engage more with businesses who have embraced social marketing - making me a happier customer.
Hooray for you, Mike!! You hit the nail on the head: Social Media is a medium, just one of many which marketers have in their marketing toolbox. It has become an essential tool but a tool nevertheless. It is not a strategy unto itself. It cannot make the burgers you sell taste better or the jeans you market fit better. It could help to make customers feel as if your company is contemporary and eager to keep you informed but the value of that only goes as far as their experience -- good or bad -- with your product. Excellent post.
Sorry Mike, need to disagree with you. Everything you said is right...key is the customer has changed. The younger generation are/have growing up on Social Media. It has become part of their life. As marketers we have to accept that it is not BS and learn and play the game.
So refreshing to see that HubSpot is still authentic and earning a reputation by being truthful.
This presentation is a nice wake up call to all the hype and BS spewed by the new generation of SEO hucksters.
Nothing will replace good business practices... not even a million friends on Facebook and Twitter.
Why bloggers who try to write engaging titles are BS
If people are not plugged into social media for marketing their business they are leaving a lot of business for their competitors. What better way to build relationships with clients and future clients.
Srini and Dave (Hale) -- I didn't see in Mike's article anything that says a marketer should NOT engage in social media; only that it is not the be all/end all that some marketing types hype it to be. It is but one of many marketing tools which can be used to deliver a marketer's message to and audience, just as TV, print media, billboards and, yes, even radio, can deliver a message.
1) Agreed
2) Hey - maybe the Inbound Marketing Summit will return to its roots, rather than being turned into a Social Media Summit?
Wow, this article/paragraph is so untrue. Social media can make customers happier and can make your company more interesting. This article is obviously titled for a reaction, but social media should now be a standard for all companies.
Social media is just another media. It's new now. And although it's a different type of media, many of the familiar strategic creative issues are at play: branding, positioning, and especially direct response.
Mike,
You're right about the overhyped nature of social media, and that will surely die down. But I think the fundamental value of social media is community, something that marketers often miss. Most marketers see SM as an opportunity to reach thousands of potential new leads, which is the old way of doing marketing. The new way is to join communities and let people become aware of your brand through your good works. It's a 2-way street. You can learn and benefit from your communities as well. Companies that utilize SM in that way do often succeed. Those that see it as a tool only are doomed to failure since they are hopelessly tied to the old push marketing tactics that are being rejected.
Mike,
A good reminder as in all things business, balance is key. No one moving part does the trick.
We are in the early stages of measuring social media's ROI.
The linkage for me with social media and the rest of the marketing mix is positioning. Understand who you are, what market you are going to define and dominate.
The clearer you are as a company on that fact - the more effective you will be with social media and the whole range of inbound marketing techniques.
If you have a bad product or service all the advertising in the world won't change the world. Social Media is simply another tool that if used properly can increase awareness or drive sales. So read the directions first.
Social media is an excellent way for employees to share their stories of the organization. Fans aren't customers. Twitter can be just noise: gone before you know what the message was supposed to be. Still, just one way to reach one audience. Not BS just not the grail.
Hi Mike,
Spot on post and presentation! It demonstrates the merit of – sometime – stating the obvious.
The biggest damage of the social media overhype is probably a further loss of credibility for marketing in the eyes of other key functions in business.
Modern marketing, as you stated it very rightly, results from an evolution older than social media. Modern marketing must be based on a very sharp understanding of all components of the business ecosystem, and on the capacity to maintain a dialogue and generate emotions with each of them across multiple channels. This is why integration is so crucial. What matters the most is the comprehensiveness and coherency of the whole marketing system, not the exact features of each particular tactic, as long as the messages and the experience are consistent
This is just perfect and speak out the truth . Yes, social media alone won't work magically , social media is just a tool, but inbound marketing is a strategy, it works like a system
But Chuck - isn't that because those companies are already interesting and are using social media in an intelligent and engaging way? The point of this post isn't that social media cannot be used for positive gain, but really it only amplifies whatever it is you already are. If your customer service sucks, it *really* sucks in social media. If you're not interesting, you're even less so in social media.
And vice versa.
Resorting to questionable language to make a point makes the greater impact as it reflects on the author.
Marketing, to a large degree, is image-making. Mike Volpe ought to start with his own.
Last time I looked Bullsh*t helped things grow and if you do right Social media does grow a business.
The strategy isn't in the technology its in the understanding of what goals you are trying to achieve via ANY communications tool be they centuries old or up to the minute.
Social media won't make your products better, but using netnography on social sites already discussing them to gain insight will, as will running social media based focus groups, and both of these should lead to greater understanding of customers and if actioned upon greater satisfaction.
Whilst I would agree social media should be only one aspect of a sound overall marketing strategy - it is the immediacy of its nature that makes it potentially THE most powerful within it.
Provocative title, but very good post. Thanks.
Yeah, misleading title. I think many people out there mistake the two and incorrectly interchange the titles. Word of mouth and "tribes" marketing has been around for hundreds of years, the difference is now you can listen as well.
- 100% agree on "social media" as a negative buzz word. A small business who hires a college kid or nephew to make a twitter account will not succeed. It must be used in conjunction with a full strategy.
Good post and nice to hear your definition of the word.
-Zach
I'm an author and my book initially sold very well with some radio interviews, and some media attention the high-profile story drew. However, when I engaged in personal social media to promote the important story, I connected with important people, received interview offers, personal messages and blog followers far beyond the results of one-dimensional, conventional publicity. I was astounded at the power of social media, and am confident, when used as an additional tool, it can help any business or purpose to be recognized. Providing the quality behind the promotion is another aspect. Marti Rulli
What you say is has truth. What you failed to acknowledge is the starring role that folks at HubSpot have been playing in propagating the bullshit. The principles of successful business are the same in the age of Zuckerberg as they were in the age of Gutenberg. You know, the printing press "dude".
Social media is media that's social. People talk and if you give them a reason to talk positively about a company or brand, then as a business you've accomplished word of mouth advertising - in a new medium with multiple access points.
It's also the evolution of brand marketing and allows not just the traditional one-way "push" communication of the past, but the present or "hype" engagement and "pull" by those who are in control: consumers, customers, shoppers.
If the message isn't targeted appropriately, or leveraging the best medium to align with intent or not compelling to capture 1 of 5,000 impressions in a day in which on average a person is exposed, perhaps the overall strategy needs to be re-visited. Not just the social media arm of it, but a holistic evaluation of what's working and what's not.
Completely agree with your assessment. To often marketers are quick to jump on the latest band wagon, from Facebook to Twitter to Foursquare to whatever comes next.
The fact is, social media is not a savior, just as you said, it should be PART of your marketing strategy. Social media is not taking SEO or PPC's place, it should be integrated into your marketing strategy.
I think it goes a little too far to ridicule Hubspotters for their devout promotion of social media. I was surprised by the title too - although, it did the trick. But Mike's post was very clear in identifying the importance of social media as an inbound marketing tool. He wasn't casting it aside. He just reminded everyone that if your product sucks or your company sucks, social media will not save you!
To paraphrase one of the Toms from Nantucket Nectars - when your product doesn't suck, marketing is easy!
So, create a remarkable product or service that sells itself - social media will be your nitrous button!
I'm 1,000% behind this headline and comment. I line up ALL my marketing channels in a row. I measure the return on each. I do more of the high ROI marketing channels and reduce money spent on the low ROI marketing channels. Might not be the top advice for my
brand but I grow faster at a lower marketing cost!
I like what you have summarized especially the headline and debate starter and we're asking our audience to weigh in.
Regardless of one's opinion if you agree or don't, this is a great conversation starter. We'd love to hear your opinions!
Love the title. Obvious info for most of us but still love the draw.
Social Media gives anyone the winning edge. Small companies have hit the ceiling due to Social Media Marketing.
It brings the product to the market and can receive feedback immediately which can be used to improve the product before it reaches the growth stage in its life cycle...
Those that don't embrace social media will be left behind in the next 5 years & I suppose these are the same people that think email is still best practice for communication. Social media cant be a fad or bu**sh*t, for someone to say that social media is b**lsh*t the same year that social media had overtaken TV in terms of marketing spend really should check there facts. Don't worry when the TV was first invented, there was critics as well.
Really like the sentiment behind this article - open a Twitter account, set up a Facebook page - and expect amazing things. As Mike states - these are just platforms - what you do with them should be joined up with all marketing activity - both outbound and inbound. I've seen great results for our clients where we've introduced social media planning into their marketing activity - it can achieve speedy responses - the platforms are immediate, transparent and measurable. More like this please. Thanks Michelle
For me social media can only truly be deemed worthwhile if you have some degree of engagement which you can place a value on. Why waste your time on something you have no transferable stats on to measure ROI?
Whether or not it makes your business more interesting depends on the quality of content you put up online.
True, if your boring offline you must be boring online - not necessarily, social media gives you the opportunity to be that little bit more creative and interesting through a variety of media.
Great slides!
It's 1 tool among many, but not one you can really ignore based on the size of the audience that's potentially available and the amount of time people spend in social media. If you look to it like some magic marketing solution on its own, yeah, you'll end up saying its bullsh*t.
The signal:noise ratio for marketers or businesses using SM can be a challenge, because while there is a big audience there, a lot of people on these services have no interested in being marketed too. That's why you have to learn how to effectively engage with people on their terms in these channels, be fun, funny, and relevant, and win trust slowly - don't be a social media push marketer.
The thing is if you want to benefit from this world, you have to live in this world, authentically, and trust that it's a long game. It's worth the effort, though - people with good presences in social media will become increasingly relevant as search becomes more social.
Straight out of the Mashable Blog Title ebook that one!
The common sense approach to social media is to use it to reach and engage with an audience, where ever they choose to congragate, rather than relying on them taking the time and trouble to find your website, click through an affiliate, click an ad etc.
Amen Mike! I couldn't agree more with you on this one. It's been a while since I wrote a blog post about being sick of all of these "social media experts" that think that knowing how to tweet is enough to call yourself a modern marketer. -.-
Can't wait for webinar, cheers!
After 5 months of building a social networking presence to add to our tried & true marketing programs we were quite impressed to find that 45% of our inbound calls in Oct were generated through that medium. Relevant materials helped it work.
Finally - the truth. I'm forwarding to my CEO today.
Very true Mike, agree with everything you say on this topic. People who understand business know that this istrue, people who think that social media is an end in itself simply do not understand business.
So what you're saying is that Social Media is not a panacea for your business's marketing... absolutely.
Thanks for the nice presentation.
We really don't need to base the company or business in Social Media only, like what you said it is a tool. A tool that helps spread the word and present our business to people that can be clients, people that are from different countries but are willing to use our services.
Hi Mike,
Thanks for your very interesting webinar. I completely agree with you as many others do. We recently discussed the same at a meeting of local marketing people here in Zurich and I made a blog post about this topic: Social media, bs or best friend? http://blog.memonic.com/archive/2010/11/15/social-media-bs-or-best-friend.html