Back in September leading social media strategist David Armano wrote a post called "How to Spot Social Media Snake Oil." BusinessWeek picked up the angle last week by pointing out the lack of ROI results; BW author Stephen Baker went further on his blog skewering one consultant in particular. Armano responded saying it's a natural evolution no different than the e-commerce hype of the late 1990s leading to concrete web strategy today.
Fun stuff. We commented with this:
David, this is very eloquent -- but I do see a major difference. In the 1990s' web bubble, the core underlying metric was *response*. Today the metric is *buzz*. And that's why this second fad will fall with more agony, because the foundation of the hype is shakier.
The first problem with social media is buzz is further up the marketing funnel than response. If you wanted to sell dog food directly to consumers via the web in 1998, you had a shot at real revenue -- response could get you there; if you want to get people chatting about dog food on Twitter today, dollars are less likely to follow. Influencing buzz is more difficult than response, harder to measure, and has a more uncertain impact on real sales (and thus business results). This is why ROI case studies with real data are comically hard to find.
The second problem is the barrier to entry as a supposed expert is minimal. While web designers in the 1990s needed to understand complex technology, and actually produce something tangible, now anyone can jump in with a blog. The oversupply of consultants and falling demand driven by skepticism are devaluing the entire social media product, if you will.
I think these two factors are why there is so much chatter about social media snake oil, and defensiveness among the consultants who often point fingers and say "they are fakes, but not me." Certain aspects of social media strategy will stick, but frankly it's more a consumer modality change, and less a concrete business tool. In the aggregate, Facebook-fed relational data sets could be a wonderful new Experian list, but at the business level it will evolve into just another channel for customer service.
For this reason I think the coming shakeout will be harder. Hope this take doesn't burst anyone's bubble ;)
2 comments:
"The second problem is the barrier to entry as a supposed expert is minimal."
Ding Ding Ding! We have a winner.
This one is going to run and run, and whilst I think there is something n your analogy with 90s eCommerce I do think there are some significant differences as well.
Part of the problem a lot of social media consultants have is that they do not have any fixed goals in mind when they advocate their campaigns and this is a terminal failure which will prevent social media from being taken seriously.
Instead the tactics employed seem to have more in common with a hippy love in or a bunch of gossiping fishwives than a marketing campaign, probably with the same likelihood of accomplishing anything at the end.
We created a framework for delivering digital marketing strategy which works on the basis of cause and effect through a relationship experience. When you start to look at things in this way and stop viewing buzz as a goal (it is simply a bi-product of campaign activity) then social media starts to make sense for the business.
Post a Comment