Social media isn't a "channel," it's an environment
Bizzuka CEO, John Munsell, and I are working on a video series dealing with how businesses can use the web to thrive in these difficult economic times. (Hopefully, we'll unveil it next week. It contains interviews with some of the best marketing minds in the country, nay, even the world.)
Somewhere during the course of producing the video I made the statement, "social media isn't a 'channel', it's an environment."
So, okay, I fully admit to being a social media kool-aid drinker and am known to get very excited about gazing at its "naval" in my never-ending quest to understand its nuances. After hearing myself say that, I had to pause and ask why I thought that was the case.
Relay For Life vs. a walkathon
Relay is about a community forming for a 24-hour period to raise funds to fight cancer. Certainly, walking is involved, but that becomes almost tangential. Where the real action happens is inside the walking track.
Participating teams set up campsites (literally), choose a theme and go all out to dress up their site. Often, teams will be seen in costumes that support their theme or T-shirts that do so. Over a 24-hour (sometimes 12) timespan this disparate group of people becomes a tribe. They laugh together, cry together, share meaningful moments that leave them both tired and exhilirated at the same time... and ready to come back and do it all over again the next year.
In my view, that's what participation in social media does.
Though it uses them, social media is much more than a set of tools. It's a mindset, a mileau, an environment that, for people who choose to live in it, can lead to the development of lasting friendships and, yes, business development.
Ad agencies don't get it
Since I cast aspersions on advertising, let me mention an AdAge article which states, "Forrester Research believes today's ad agencies are not well-structured to take on tomorrow's marketing challenges, needing to move from making messages to establishing community connections."
Agencies tend to look at everything as a campaign, and social media is not a campaign, nor merely a channel. To define it thus is to do a disservice. (See, told you I'm a kool-aid drinker.)
Marketing in this era is no longer about crafting messages, but participating in communities. You have to be in it for the long-haul.
Former Forrester analyst and budding entrepreneur Peter Kim says, "once you start thinking about using social tools as campaign support, you're thinking in terms of one-night stands with your customers, not building long-term relationships."
So, that's it... social media is not a campaign, not a channel, not a one-night stand, to quote Peter. It's about building relationships, participation in conversations, being part of a tribe.
It's understanding that authenticity and transparency are its cornerstones. It's recognizing that the customer has a face and a name and should be treated as a partner in co-creation. It's business gone personal, not unlike the Toby Bloomberg talks about. Companies that get that will wonder how they ever got along without it.
That's my view anyway. What's yours?
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