As the spin of the social media storm unfurls, the vast dearth of businesses are jumping with both feet into the medium. In many ways social media is the broad new frontier of business but equally prone to series of misgivings promoted by public relations campaign by the medium itself. In the most peculiar of twists, the public relations of the social medium have wrongfully suggested that it is the answer to every marketing effort but missing broadly on a number of significant points.

Social medium is a potential massive influencer in the public eye. While the medium turns on the dial, making much of the top shelf logic often antiquated before it hits the new release, it also has based upon an interpretations of classic relationship marketing.

Of the list of numerous flaws in present day social media effort, is the lack of understanding how the medium relates to the market place, whether the approach is applicable or boils with passion. The fascination of the social media outlet and the misguided vision that the greatest readership, aka “friends”, will carry your message has distorted the reality that your audience must participate if the campaign is to be successful.

This simple fault was part of the great undoing of MySpace and equally the growth of Facebook from its frontier days. While the MySpace crew found itself trapped in the spiral of friend requests as sport, it failed to see the loss of individual personalities, interactive relationships and of-course the all too familiar rouge would play a major role in its fall from grace. Facebook, possibly by pure good fortune, tapped into the youthful market, built its market with virtually no dreary rules and set the stage that the world would eventually want to join.

The social media storm on the horizon is merely a veneer of the classic, where the updated raconteur story weaves its tale through public, ultimately influencing decisions. The twist of audience size and listing audience is a seismatic shift as the applicability of the message is the ultimate deciding factor in the influence and how the tale is spread virally. For the shill of the social media outlet, this basic notion cuts deeply into the approach that adding followers and friends is the magic cure-all.

The all-important followers only has mettle if their message resonates passionately with the audience and for many who build an audience without care to this, they find their releases effectively have the success rate of the coldest of cold call of a number from telephone book.

In the 1962 Morton DaCosta classic, “The Music Man”, the brilliant Billy Preston plays the travelling salesman Professor Harold Hill. A huckster, looking to swindle the good people of River City, Iowa for the costs of building a marching band, professes the “think system” in which his admiring students learn how to play their instrument without of-course musical training. While naturally through the allure of Marian the librarian and her support, the perfect ending, with 76 Trombones, comes true as the exquisite ending the band playing in perfect tune comes to volition.

For those in social media, the lesson of Professor Harold Hill’s “Think System” rings true. Be passionate about your story and build your message to the marketplace staying current and relevant.

Prepared by J. Davies
©Helix World Media, 2010.
All rights reserved

The swirling change of media has been in a constant storm for no less than half a century. With the backdrop of Marshall McLuhan’s notion of “global village” not only ringing true but also turning into overdrive, the modern media has become both the pulpit to deliver information in hyper-speed and a test of constant evolution. Delivery methods have gone through a series of changes with technologies improving, this trend will continue at an alarming pace.

For the broad media, this serves as both an opportunity and requirement to evolve, lest face obsolescence. What was once a simple process of delivering information within the bedrock of classic journalistic principles has both eroded into a series of highly questionable approaches turning the modern media into an “entertaining” and “interactive” experience but placing a enormous weight on shunting information into the public’s eyes. The now prophetic tone of Mr. McLuhan’s “medium is the message” is ringing true but the further question on the horizon is whether the modern media, as well as news providers, recognize the need to evolve in rapidly changing environments.

In the most base, simplistic review, it appears that the vast majority of decision makers are peering into the future with their foundation set in the past. The failing grade of media outlets faced with plummeting readership is moving towards paid subscription and serves as evidence that they have lost touch with the modern world of information moving freely. The revenue stream is not simply from the quality of content but how it is delivered through the portals of today. Successful media outlets must understand this crucial test and will continue to separate themselves from the flock should they do this, creating a new series of major “players”.

The foundation of media was virtually unchanged, or at least to some degree, for many decades but now is in constant flux. The vast horizon of Social Media has leapt to the forefront but unlike “conventional” media, its window of being timely is significantly shorter. Customer loyalty within the broad Social Media sector is a rare breed where the errors of MySpace last decade seem to be infiltrating Facebook in the present. While the latter readies for an IPO in the near term, its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, seems to have forgotten what made it a success during his teen years. Is it a matter of poor understanding of the foundation of success in the modern media or with the founder now twenty-six, has it lost touch with the grassroots of what turns Social Media? With Facebook’s shocking errors with culling privacy, it appears the latter and if they are not careful they will merely become a birthplace of the next major player in the media.

Modern media is on course for evolution of unforeseen levels and its present day look will be radically different by decades end. For the successful media outlet and marketing manager, the first key to success and growth is recognizing the inevitability of change and the vision to move boldly forward.

Prepared by J. Davies
©Helix World Media, 2010.
All rights reserved