Twitter's Kicking, Not Quitting

The Beginning of "Quitter"
I recently joined a debate on Twitter...actually, it might be "the" debate on Twitter, at least in terms of the subject, because it seems many people now deem themselves ready to announce to the world their expert analysis on the network's long-term viability.

Here's a link to the article by my friend and a very intelligent, compassionate and accomplished individual: Steve Baker (who has an incredible story in a marvelous book, by the way, also available here) http://www.pushingwateruphillblog.blogspot.com/

Here is my comment to Steve's post:

Twitter...has recently launched some business-oriented initiatives that may cement its profit model—something with which every player in this nascent industry struggles—and move the product beyond “fad.“ In the next 24 months this industry will experience consolidation, shakeout and a move toward standardization. Twitter may change but its brand is too strong within the market to just disappear.

Here are two of the initiatives Twitter has undertaken that set it apart:

SalesForce
http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=15032
Here's my mantra to companies and organizations debating whether or not to begin and maintain a social media presence: You don't get to decide whether or not your company uses social networking. If you have a business with customers, you get to decide at what point you join the discussion about you. With SalesForce, when a customer "tweets" about your company, product or service, you know and record all available information about that customer and her comment, and immediately gain an opportunity to interface, publicly, about the concern or compliment. That's powerful stuff.

Listen, I think SalesForce offers poor training, falls short on the front end of the sales cycle, sells its very high-priced product to anyone who has the ability--and not necessarily the need--to buy it, and I know for a fact that it has lots of dissatisfied users who use the product to a fraction of its potential. I also think SalesForce, like its competitors, aggressively forwards the unconscionable myth that purchasing software will solve your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) challenges...throw money at a problem and the problem will go away. That said, it is the mac daddy of enterprise CRM software and any social network pursuing an innovative revenue model would be wise to partner up with SalesForce and bet on the come, i.e. that the company will employ its current success toward addressing the aforementioned weaknesses. Twitter has done exactly this. Twitter may, in fact, provide the vehicle by which SalesForce works with its customers to identify and resolve its own CRM issues. Talk about powerful references and testimonials--and differentiation?

ExecTweets (http://www.exectweets.com/)
Good article here http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/stories/2009/05/18/story11.html?b=1242619200%5E1829407)

ExecTweets caters to big business owners, offering itself as a communications tool for customers and employees. Given the continuing reprisals people incur from their employers stemming from their conduct on Facebook, it will be especially interesting to watch the development of the latter part of that equation. Anyway, these big shots are actually giving it a go. Twitter has seized upon a fundamental truth about guys in charge: You'll never go broke appealing to their egos.

If you can win over a corporate CEO, you have a future. Big companies are terrified of change and any technology they didn't invent or of which they don't own a piece. Plus, these people are busy and demanding--there's an understatement. Getting them to experiment, and being able to log favorable comments about your product, is a monumental accomplishment in and of itself.

Conclusion
In the mid-90's, most of us didn't "get" the Internet. In 1995 I worked for what was, at the time, the biggest cable TV company in the world and we weren't certain we should maintain a web page.

I'm not a "power Tweeter" and I don't--at the moment--have a strategy simply aimed at achieving a huge Twitter followership. But I think to be dismissive of the tool is to demonstrate a lack of research and knowledge.

I do agree that of all these social networks, Twitter is the most difficult to define and understand. I, for one, found it largely unmanageable until Bill Tamminga showed me TweetDeck (http://www.tweetdeck.com), and I think Twitter only becomes useful and manageable when used through third-party applications (you might also try http://seesmic.com/, http://www.minggl.com/, and/or http://www.twhirl.org/... but ye cats, throw a rock in any direction and you'll hit five more). This doesn't mean it's going to disappear; it means it has some challenges to address. Big difference.

And big differentiator, which makes it all the more likely that Twitter doesn't just survive, it thrives. It changes, but it thrives.

False Choices: Facebook and Four Way Stops

"What is a friend? A friend is a single soul dwelling within two bodies." - Aristotle

How to Change the Wind
My wife--my business partner, mother to my children, my reason for living--directs traffic from inside her car. She'll sit in the driver's seat with the windows up telling cars, "Okay, now you go. Now I go. Hey! Not you! You don't go yet!" I wonder at times if she actually believes she can dictate how people will move through the most mysterious and misunderstood anomaly of American suburban travel: The four-way stop.

Of course, she cannot. In fact, it may be she who doesn't know the rules. It may be that the rules are subject to individual interpretation up to the moment when a cop arrives and starts handing out tickets for doing it wrong. Of course, when the cop leaves, we're right back to the same anarchic state in which we were before he got there. Fat lot of good that did us.

So Facebook was created for young people to be silly and make nice with old friends and now people (like me) have shown up and are polluting the previously unspoiled air with business. "People I work with," I hear ad nauseum, "keep wanting to be my Facebook 'friend.' I don't want to 'friend' on Facebook with business people. That's what LinkedIn is for. How can I keep Facebook personal?"


If Only Everyone Were More Like Me
If I had a dollar for every time I'd heard this question, I'd have enough to mount a really spiffy public address system on the family vehicle so that my wife's verbal traffic directions may actually have some impact. I was once told Facebook wasn't made for business so it wasn't a good place for businesspeople to network and collaborate. I recently heard a speaker advise a group of entrepreneurs to decline business invitations on Facebook and direct them to LinkedIn.

Game that out. Doesn't work, does it? Did you tick anyone off? Did something get lost in translation? Did everyone currently or potentially in your network get the message?

Whatever these things started out to be is not what they are, nor what they will be. If you really need a place to misbehave online, there will be a social network that plays to your niche, that has intentionally poor search engine optimization and on which you can use a alias just in case. (Don't like that idea? Go to www.ning.com and start your own.) The overwhelming evidence is, however, that Facebook is being taken over by grown ups who behave online like they do in public, and who mix business with personal.

For more in-depth discussion on that matter, there are any number of blogs out there, including earlier issuances of Swift Kick.


Losing Your Lunch
Here's the converse, on which I could only buy a souped-up megaphone but that's definitely out there: "I don't care how wonderful your chicken salad sub was. I'm only on Facebook to do business. How can I filter out all the updates about how many pounds you've dropped using Wii and only get the business stuff?"

Good news: If you're not interested in other people and what matters to them, you won't have to worry about having too many customers. We connect on a personal level because we can, because we want to. We do business with people we know and understand. Don't believe me? Take a look at the "us vs them" model so prevalent in corporate America and tell me how it's doing these days. We are witnessing the end of an era; the dinosaurs who once ruled are disappearing into history. The continents of global business are drifting. We live in a world of transparency. I don't need a private eye; I have Google, LinkedIn and Facebook; and even if I don't know you I know someone who knows someone who does.

Within the next--oh, let's say two years, social media will develop content filters sophisticated enough to help you efficiently cut through this "clutter," but for now you're stuck with it. Oh, sure, you can "hide" content and we all do--I don't want to be responsible for bad language on my page,
for example, so I'll turn you off if you express yourself with naughty words--but think carefully because the same lady who likes to inform you of her satisfaction level with her pedicure might also be the same one who publicly laments her inability to find a satisfactory professional who can re-design her office interior, web page, company logo, etc., etc.

And really, I pity you. Facebook, I tell my audiences, is LinkedIn for humans. Leave yesterday's corporate behind and come be a human with the rest of us. Where did you go for lunch? Maybe I've been there. Maybe I had a funny experience. Maybe that's where Tom Brady knocked over my beer with his throwing arm the year after he won his first MVP award. Maybe that's just the beginning of a great story. Doesn't matter, really, you'll never hear it and we'll never connect on that level because you don't want to share your opinion of a chicken salad sub.

You have to operate within the culture. On LinkedIn, don't you dare talk about your lunch. On Facebook, eventually you have to. One's all business all the time, the other is where we go to let people know that maybe we are or will do business together and regardless, I care about whether or not you're doing well. That's not weakness and it's not a waste of time. It's being a person. There's not a magic formula on how much business vs how much personal you can do, but like anything else anymore be entertaining and informative or be left alone.

Separating "Me" and "Myself" from "I"
This will be quick: Are you a small business operator? Do you work for a company that has customers? Do you have accounts that you manage? If you answered "yes" to any one of these or virtually any other question about business, your personality is a large part of the product that you market. People will do business with people...(emphasize "people," pause for effect...)with whom they feel comfortable; people that they know. Want to be Zeke the buttoned-up financial analyst by day and "the Mad, Mad, Mad Zekester of Blood Underground, the best unsigned Goth/Death Metal Fusion band on the Eastern Seaboard" after dark? Sorry, um, Zekester, that ship has sailed. At least one of your multiple personalities is going to have to live "off the grid." And...well, his days are numbered, regardless. Truth finds a way.

Putting a Bow on it
Being all-powerful in any instance is not a realistic expectation. Social media is a nascent industry and it can't keep up with its own growth so some patience will be required. It will be a while until you'll be able to customize your tools to your preferred modus operandi.

You go be you. Act like your mother's watching. She might be. Act like you care and you might actually start to care.

Read Aristotle. It will make you smarter and you'll have some stuff to contribute if you're not ready to talk about culinary affairs or traffic; and it might help you come up with a creative way to get your smart, hard working, hot, sexy wife to start reading your blog.


Epilogue

1. In the countries that use four-way stops, pedestrians always have priority at crosswalks – even at unmarked ones, which exist as the logical continuations of the sidewalks at every intersection with approximately right angles – unless signed or painted otherwise.
2. Whichever vehicle first stops at the stop line – or before the crosswalk, if there is no stop line – has priority.
3. If two vehicles stop at the same time, priority is given to the vehicle on the right.
4. If three vehicles stop at the same time, priority is given to the two vehicles going in opposite directions, if possible.
5. If four vehicles stop, drivers usually use gestures and other communication to establish right-of-way.

(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic)

Email and Social Media

Prologue

Earlier this week I shared a Media Post article (http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=105012#comments) called, Social Vs. Email: It's The Wrong Debate. This morning I read an article in my local community newspaper about business and social media that contained a tongue-in-cheek assertion that, "email is for old people. (http://coloradocommunitynewspapers.com/articles/2009/04/28/littleton_independent/news/30_hc_biz_tweet_li_ce.txt) ."


I'm a "synergy" guy. I recently sat with a client listening to an advertising proposal from a big radio outfit that included integrated use of air time and Internet. Walking away from the meeting, I was asked if the proposal had merit. It did. These guys were good. "If I could only afford one component," asked my customer, "which one should it be?" None. Your tactics should take each other into account, build on each other and mutually reinforce a consistent branding theme as part of an overarching strategy built to achieve specific goals. The National Football League just held its annual college draft. It's easy to tell who's better at it. Teams who draft a running back because its a sexy pick and one is available lose ground to competitors who target a speedy outside linebacker at a value-commensurate point in the process because they're converting from a 4-3 defense to a 3-4.


So, when small business owners start asking themselves about whether to make the financial investment in an email campaign or the time investment in social media, they're already heading down the wrong path.



Expert Analysis
Still, the question about the future of email is valid. For a perspective I haven't encountered on blogs, microblogs, Google alerts, etc., I interviewed Suzanne Norman, Director of Community Relations for Emma (http://www.myemma.com/). Emma is "an email marketing and communications service that's taken a unique approach to web-based software."


Swift Kick is not sponsored but believes in promoting its contributors. Emma on Emma:

We think it should be easy to use (goodbye, cluttered interface). It should be made for you (farewell, generic templates). And it should even be fun (see ya around, support phone queue). It's all about email marketing in style, and it's why 20,000 small and midsize businesses, non-profits and agencies have chosen Emma to power their email newsletters and campaigns.

Suzanne Norman on "the future of email:"


How is social media impacting email?
With social media, there's a new inbox. It's not just email anymore. For every social network you join, you'll have private and public messages to check and reply to. That means a couple of things for small businesses sending email.

One, we've all got more information coming at us than ever. For a small business to get their email message to stand out, it's important to have a good grasp of the best practices. That means knowing what your subscribers want from you and how often they want to hear it. It means adding a personal touch to your campaigns so they fit in alongside emails from Aunt Bernice and notifications about yet another weird high school friend who found you on Facebook. And it means offering value to your subscribers, whether it's with your own content, insider information, links to other people's stuff, a discount or a special offer. It's what consumers expect in exchange for giving you their information, not to mention their time and attention.

Second, it's a reminder that small business owners need to know where their subscribers are and join them there. If, in addition to checking email, they're spending time on social networking sites - and 67 percent of folks say it's the number one thing they do online - then it's probably worth pairing your email efforts with a social media strategy.

How can they work in synergy?
I appreciate that question. A lot of the chatter out there tries to pit email against social media in some kind of caged communication channel death match. But I think they're both at their best when they complement each other. And they do, quite nicely. Email supports notifications and alerts that drive me to the, ahem, eight social networks I'm a part of.

I see folks send an email campaign then post a link to it on Twitter to extend its reach. Just as common, I love to see companies who've added links to their Twitter & Facebook pages in their email campaigns. And I frequently see folks tweeting a link to their email signup page, asking people to go beyond the casual 140-character level commitment and get to know their message and their brand at a whole new level.

It's also important to remember that each channel has its unique strengths. Social networks help keep your messages personal, timely, short, and very sharable. Email gives you a chance to pair those messages with particular segments of your audience and gives you plenty of visual real estate to show off great design and branding.

How will I use email 1 year from now? 3 years? 5?
Email's tremendously influential, and it'll continue to be 1, 3, and 5 years from now. Whether I'm asking as a friend, colleague or marketer, I can ask for your email address knowing it's overwhelmingly like you'll have one. Habeas put out some numbers last year showing that 67 percent of folks prefer email as a communications channel over other online vehicles. And 65 percent believe it'll be that way in five years. So that's what the numbers are telling us about the general perception.

And I think the inbox is and will continue to be a place where consumers are expecting and liking promotional and marketing messages. There are some fantastic numbers from Epsilon and ROI Research showing that 84 percent of customers like getting email from companies they registered with, and half of them saved messages for review later.

As an industry, where is email/email marketing in its life cycle (introduction, growth, maturity, decline)?
You know, it depends on who you ask. We talk to plenty of small business owners who either haven't tried or aren't familiar with email marketing, so for some, there's a tremendous amount of introduction still to be made.

In terms of growth, here's a nice statistic from Datran Media. They surveyed marketing executives, and email led the list of channels they're expected to increase their spending on in 2009, with nearly 60 percent budgeting more for email.

In another sense, I think there's a lot of growth happening around a renewed sense of best practices among email marketers out there. They're understanding that their audiences are more media savvy these days, that they have more sources for information than ever. So they're forgoing the tired old "batch and blast" approach. They're starting to segment their big list and craft different messages to different groups. They're adding more personalized information, and they're doing it with a personal touch. And they're testing different versions of subject lines, creative and content to see what their subscribers respond to. It's an encouraging trend for email as a whole.

Without those smarter tactics, consumers will get tired of the same companies sending the same discounts over and over again, and email will lose a bit of its effectiveness. I'd encourage small businesses to invest in the strategy and tools that make a more refined approach to email.


Conclusion
The world of "shotgun" emails is for yesterday. Use a rifle with a scope. Target. Ready, aim, then fire. Skip or rush either of those first two steps and negate the effectiveness of the third.

Time and money are limited commodities. Do not throw a dart and hope a tactic works. Set goals, form a strategy, resesarch what tactics work with each other to yield the best results within that strategy, and move toward implementation. If you're trying to decide between social media or email, shift that thinking to how you might use both to make the whole of your campaign greater than the sum of its parts.

Special thanks to Suzanne Norman and Gina LaMar of Emma for their assistance and contributions to this article.

MySpace Moves, Facebook Surprises

Turn and Face the Strain

"Baby, I was never cool enough to get a job at a record store; but if I had, I
wouldn't want you anymore." - The Refreshments

We knew MySpace needed a new CEO. Small surprise, they picked the guy from Facebook who brought in all that dough from Microsoft. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/25/technology/companies/25myspace.html?_r=1&ref=technology.

Does this mean MySpace now starts to try to look and feel more like Facebook? And if so, which version of Facebook? The one that created all the buzz, flying to 200 members and gaining working professionals who are almost as likely to purchase a music store as they are digital music? Or the one that wants to be Twitter and that has initiated a large degree of denial and resistance among the faithful?

Swiftly, now, those "social media strategists" whose big idea is, "make a Facebook page for your business" can now turn their brains back on. This industry is nascent. Product quality across the board is poor. We are not anywhere close to having any sort of standardization. The lead dog will change. Cultures and demographics will continue to change. A stupendous amount of money has been invested by extremely large players in companies that can't, despite massive popularity and ubiquitous media exposure, settle on a revenue model that brings them to break even against their soaring infrastructure costs. Mildly problematic (he asked facetiously)?

Everything about the social media industry will change and change again. If you're telling your clients you have, "the answer," you'd best follow up immediately with, "for the moment." Letting your clients in on the fact that things are changing isn't good enough. To formulate strategies that position them--and you--to ride atop the crest of the change curve, you must be ready for the changes that haven't happened yet.


Look Out, You Rock and Rollers

One more chance, I'll try this time
I'll give you yours, I won't take mine
I'll listen up, pretend to care
Go on ahead, I'll meet you there - Blink 182

Why did Facebook accept the terms of service its users wrote despite the fact that turnout for the vote was so low? http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/techchron/detail?blogid=19&entry_id=38986 Lots of reasons. Here are some:

1. Good business move. Worst thing you can do is alienate your customers.
2. Though turnout was low, margin was disparate. 74 percent of the vote? Obama didn't even get that.
3. A gift for the Facebook PR department, and an act consistent with Facebook's culture.
4. The only justification they had for going with the rules they drew up would be that their self-defined threshhold of 30 percent
   http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebooks_site_governance_vote_a_massive_con.php wasn't reached. Imagine the uproar.

Okay, let's talk about these numbers. "In most online communities," writes usability guru Jakob Nielsen, "90 percent of users never contribute, nine percent...contribute a little and one percent of users account for almost all of the action. (http://www.useit.com/alertbox/participation_inequality.html)"

Quick math that explains a few things:

• If Facebook charged $1 per YEAR for a subscription, and it has 200 million users, that equates to a gross revenue bump of $200 million per year, right? Wrong. It's at best ten percent of 200 million, as a few users will quit due to (completely misplaced) outrage (that demonstrates our lack of ability to separate "entitlement" and "utility" from "business" and "luxury item." But I digress...) and the vast majority of the passive 90 percent would choose to forego the experience entirely if they had to maintain a subscription at any cost. What makes Facebook attractive to investors? 400 million eyeballs.
• It's safe to assume Facebook picked 30 percent--60 million--because they knew they were safe. Now they've done us all a favor. They've given the people what they want. They'll play their hits, not just the album cuts they're trying to promote. And maybe we'll cut them some slack about the new look and feel...
• The turnout was three tenths of one percent. Not even Nielsen's activist one percent turned out. This is a troubling item for Facebook's leadership.

They're Quite Aware of What They're Going Through

So, Facebook regains some legitimacy, acts like a partner instead of a distant corporation and prepares to do battle with one of its own. This is a fun ride, y'all. Keep kickin'.

Involuntary Engagement

The Domino's Effect

Any of my coaching clients, marketing prospects or speaking audiences have heard me say this: "If you have a business with customers, you're engaged in social media whether you want to be or not." Of course, if you have a business without customers, you have no business.


For any skeptics or those who find the statement to be ambiguous, please take a moment to review this week's activity on YouTube and Twitter regarding Domino's Pizza. This USA Today article gives a mercifully brief summary of the affair and some fine strategy points: http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2009-04-15-kitchen-pr-dominos-pizza_N.htm.




You are not immune.
This week, I had a LinkedIn exchange with a former colleague who now works in the PR department for a major US airport. Within current leadership, there exists some debate on the wisdom of maintaining a social media presence. Within 30 seconds of being alerted this debate existed, I learned that two people at that airport were tired of waiting to board a plane, another thought it was too hot in the shuttle bus and there was a ticket counter line in which at least one customer was behaving in a "volatile" fashion.

The next day, we had a spring snowstorm here in Denver. The online rumor mill was alive and well with road closings, snowfall estimates and, yes, postings about planes. Even if the rumors were true, they weren't newsworthy--at this writing, Denver International Airport has announced no flight cancellations associated with the storm--but that doesn't mean people don't attach validity to them, or that all "twits" with large numbers of "followers" care about truth before "retweeting."

All of us are now a click away from providing CNN, FoxNews and virtually every other media outlet with filler fodder. Think you can depend on the media to check facts before reporting a story? Think again. If it ever actually worked like that, it doesn't now. Social media as an entity has never even attempted to act like it wants to bear that burden. We can safely assume it won't in the future. (Want proof? Do a search for "Groups" on Facebook and take a look at some of the garbage passing for "common interests." "Soldiers are not Heroes?" Please.)

Want another example? Thursday night, I met a gentleman who works for Wells Fargo. He wasn't sure if his company was exposed in this regard. Know what I just found at the top of a Twitter stream? This: "Looks like my assumption that #wellsfargo will screw my fiancee out of her severance is probably going to be correct. Any pro bono lawyers?" Let's assume this is an empty threat and that the claim is unfounded. Does that mean that Wells Fargo has no risk, or that it has something to gain by not engaging in this now-public conversation?



The Medium is the Message
Nothing is less accountable or more dangerous than a mob. One of the downsides of social media is its capacity to degenerate into a mob mentality. The message--any message--is bound to find people with a proclivity to pour gasoline on a fire. If it's your fire, you'll want to know immediately.

Perception is reality. Don't let the mob decide how your business is perceived. Form and execute your social media strategy before someone sticks your cheese in his nose and swiftly kicks you where it hurts.

More Debunking...

A story about my kid
My kids are aspiring actors. This week, the talent agency called and my daughter auditioned for a radio commercial. The agency emailed me the script, we phoned the contact and my little Goofball delivered her lines beautifully. Later that afternoon, three representatives from the Denver-based advertising agency to which our talent agency had referred us would hear I-don't-know-how-many additional auditions. From this pool they will select their favorites for a second round of auditions next week, and bring in the talent fortunate enough to be cast in the part next Friday to actually lay down the audio. For Goofball, this consists of three sentences as part of a single 60-second spot. Then the agency assembles all the elements and goes into post-production...

Certainly, the end client, a Baltimore-based hospital, has assured itself of a quality product that stands a very good chance of gaining approval on first pass and of being well received by the consumer. They've put their faith in reputable consultants and a proven process. Big investment, high accountability, big return.

Conversely, my 20 years as a promotions producer are full of, "You got pipes, you can read, you do the voice over." Need a female voice? Grab the news anchor on her way to the edit bay or see if the lady from PR can do you a solid. This saves time, money, and...er, time and money. Lots. It also provides flexibility, which is especially important in dynamic corporate environments where pricing and messaging points change because the right person changed her mind or because
you have an opportunity to get out in front of a competitor. Re-voice? No problem. Breakeven is exponentially easier to reach. So long as you have the horses in your stable, you can keep running them.

Why is he talking about his kid?
Here's a good article: Five Phases of Social Media Marketing by Janet Lee Johnson: http://socialcomputingjournal.com/viewcolumn.cfm?colid=789. This is an excellent read for anyone trying to make sense of social networks as a marketing vehicle. Johnson's walk through the approach demystifies the medium by applying steps and tactics fundamental not just to marketing planning but to any targeted effort. Whether you're thinking about launching a new product line, acquiring a competitor, hosting an event or finishing your basement, Johnson's phases: Discovery, Strategy, Skills [identification], Execution and Maintenance are solid pillars for any implementation.

Johnson stresses, "that social media marketing is not free." She cites and endorses the $50K figure cited in the BusinessWeek article previously argued in this blog space (http://mikehanbery.blogspot.com/2009/03/swift-kickin-rebuttal-debunking-six.html). Johnson amplifies and clarifies the argument that effective use of the free tools out there (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, blogs, Search Engine Optimization of website) requires expertise, which doesn't come free.

This is true. The time and effort you invest are quantifiable. Training costs money. Bringing in a consultant to execute the plan through phases adds time and money to the process in exchange for better returns on the end product. Why do you hire a bookkeeper? Because you're not an accountant. Why don't you fix your own computer? Because you'd only make it worse (and void the warranty). Why don't you construct your own marketing plan? Because it will be worth what you paid for it, fraught with missed opportunities.

Here's another perspective, courtesy of an April 7, 2009, Financial Times article, "Social Media Puts Fizz into Coke (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3b8b4cf2-230b-11de-9c99-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1)":

Liz Miller, Vice President...at the CMO Council...warns that in such a nascent
market there remains a risk of being sold snake oil. "Please don't ever hire
a Twitter consultant," [says Miller].

Get to the point, Mike.
Do you need to be an expert in social media to use it to your advantage? No. Should you get some help?

In the marketplace of ideas, barriers to entry are thankfully low. Experts are not always swimming in the same pond. Some social media marketing experts are working to establish a price point--$50,000--for social media marketing consulting. Now, I'll be more than happy to work for that figure but I don't think my audience has it to invest. For most of the people I see at networking events, who have sat at my kitchen table on Saturday sipping coffee, who delicately walk the line between deliberate pursuit of business growth and alienating friends with the "hard sell," and who invite me to speak to their groups about the social media phenomenon, $50K is a huge chunk of their annual revenue figure, and may well be equivalent to the annual salary an entrepreneur affords herself.

The $50K price point creates a false barrier to entry for small and emerging businesses in an area that provides outstanding opportunities for collaboration, brand recognition, market development and leads generation.

Social media strategies are not an area where absolutes are safely applicable. If you have the resources to take weeks to employ multiple levels of agencies for a single radio spot, you may well benefit from $50K worth of consultants to research, launch and maintain your social media program. If you don't, there are people out here swiftly kicking to help you for less.

In sum...
Even if you don't have $50K, you can--and should--play in the social media sandbox. As with all other aspects of your business, scale your expectations. If you talk to a Twitter consultant who tells you to expect the same results from a self-managed strategy as you would from a $50K investment, swiftly kick that snake oil salesman to the proverbial curb. Just as there are those of us who write, source, voice and turn out TV and radio spots in hours or days rather than weeks, there are social media strategits willing, able and modeled to work on a smaller scale.

But if you have $50K and decide I'm your man, I'm sure Goofball can help me spend it.

About the Blogger
Mike Hanbery (http://www.linkedin.com/in/mikehanbery) is an Executive MBA with
20 years of experience in marketing and media at the national and local level
for startups to Fortune 500. His company, Hanbery & Hanbery, Inc.
(http://www.hanbery.com) works with small nonprofit and for profit businesses in
accounting, business development and marketing. Mike speaks on, trains, designs
and implements social media strategies and is co-author of the soon to be
released book: Connect and Contribute: Creating a Social Business.

Twitter: Show Me the Money

Time is money...?
Saying it has "lots of time for experimentation (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,511000,00.html," Twitter will explore and probably offer commercial accounts this year, using a subscription model as a revenue generator
(http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Messaging-and-Collaboration/Twitter-Offering-Commercial-Accounts-For-a-Price-723430/).

Twitter as SaaS
Another or perhaps ancillary potential revenue source for Twitter is its inclusion on the dashboard of CRM giant SalesForce
(http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Enterprise-Applications/Salesforcecom-Puts-Twitter-in-Its-Service-Cloud-351280/).

Giving the Big Dogs a Bone
Microsoft is Facebook's biggest backer and may be the source that fosters cooperation, or at least "coopetition," between the two surging social networks as it recently announced its sponsorship of ExecTweets, which is designed to deliver the microblogs of big dog American execs to the great unwashed (us)
(http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Search-Engines/Microsoft-Now-Sponsoring-Twitter-Enterprise-Site-725461/). While sponsorship is not a revenue stream, this strikes me as a kickin' marketing tactic: Well-timed and presenting directly the value of the service to a vain set of decision-makers who in recent years have probably authorized thousands of dollars on high-priced, low-paid, twenty-something consultants to poke around their companies and deliver reports stating
that everything will turn around if they just communicate better.

What is leads generation worth to you?
Applications like TweetDeck and Twhirl are being used for leads generation but Twitter hasn't figured out exactly how to procure a "finder's fee" for the business deals it helps facilitate. Twitter remains overtly committed to avoid an advertising model. This sets an interesting converse relationship with Facebook, which continues to vow it will not charge for subscriptions but is experimenting with advertising, and shows a bold willingness--determination?--to
participate in what would surely be a large share of a projected $2.4 billion chunk of cash flow in 2009 (http://www.imediaconnection.com/news/22493.asp).

Turn and face the strain.
Just because these networks started out "free" doesn't mean they're going to remain that way. According to your user agreement, they owe you little or nothing and can change the terms at any time. The more social media fits into your marketing and sales strategy, the more important it is to follow these developments and plan for changes.

Twitter and especially ExecTweets will be interesting to follow to see not only how well it takes hold at the corporate CEO level and what happens from there but to watch what happens within the social media industry thereafter. These folks didn't get to where they are by not thinking ahead.

The fact that Microsoft is Facebook's sugar daddy and chief investor in ExecTweets indicates rubber is getting closer to meeting road in the developing...er, relationship...between the two networks. Astute social media users and strategists will be ready for any and all possible changes. That is, to swiftly kick with the current.

About the Blogger
Mike Hanbery (http://www.linkedin.com/in/mikehanbery) is an Executive MBA with 20 years of experience in marketing and media at the national and local level
for startups to Fortune 500. His company, Hanbery & Hanbery, Inc. (http://www.hanbery.com) works with small nonprofit and for profit businesses in
accounting, business development and marketing. Mike speaks on, trains, designs and implements social media strategies and is co-author of the soon to be
released book: Connect and Contribute: Creating a Social Business.