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Let’s Discuss Social Media Taboo

June 14, 2010 By 23 Comments

socialmediabandwagon Okay, let me get started by saying that I don’t blog a lot about social media anymore because I don’t want to fall into the category of being a self-proclaimed guru, but I do this for a living, and yes I have clients that pay me to do this for them as well, so I feel no shame in admitting that I might know more than a lot of people handing out advice these days because this is my full-time gig.  Not bragging, just saying.  At Pleth, we have clients reach out to us on an almost daily basis for social media consulting and it’s something that I think we, as an industry, pretty much do right w/ the exception of a few bad apples and of course some companies that try to do it themselves internally.

I am not for sure who all out there is advising their clients to do these two things, and maybe some are just taking this upon themselves, but I know of at least one firm (won’t mention any names, they are out of state anyway) who advised a client to do this and it sent shivers down the base of my spine. I wanted to set the record straight, or at least weigh in on my opinion as to why these things are being handled completely wrong…

Businesses / Organizations Should Not Be Facebook Profiles (They are not Humans!)

Here’s the thing, there are right ways and wrong ways for your business or organization to get involved on Facebook.  You even have some options when it comes to pages or groups, depending entirely what your motivation is for getting involved.  I hate to see a friend request from a business or an organization.  This is not correct. 

Surely at some point during the process while this profile was being setup, this had to seem like it wasn’t right.  I don’t know, maybe at the point where they asked you your birthday, or your sex, possibly even relationship status.  I mean, does your business date?  Does your business have a gender?  Hopefully not, that would be illegal in most states.  Sorry if this sounds like a rant, but this gets under my skin a little bit, especially when I find that a firm has consulted someone to do things this way so that they have some different options that pages or groups presently don’t have. I have to scratch my head and wonder if that is not some sort of malpractice somewhere down the lines.  Don’t we, as an industry have a fiduciary obligation to our clients not to steer them wrongly?

Companies / Organizations with Geo-Social Profiles (Where you Goin?)

Why would a company add me as a friend on Foursquare / Gowalla?  You got me, I have no idea but I have had 2 do this recently and it made me wonder.  I mean I know your company, the request wasn’t out of line, but your company is comprised of hundreds of employees and you have 2 physical locations.  How come you want to be friends w/ me?  Your company is not representative of one person, where are you going to check in at?  Are you physically going to move your entire building to another location and check-in?  Of course not.  If you are interested in knowing where I am checking in at, you don’t have to be my friend to find out that information.

Now that that part almost sounded like a rant, so let me back up a little bit and commend you on your interest in wanting to be involved with geo-social.  You are on the cutting edge my friend, no doubt.  But, there are right ways and wrong ways to get involved with trends, and honestly by doing it wrong you can make yourself look worse than had you not even tried at all.  (example: me trying to sing karaoke).

If you want to get involved with geo-social as a company or an organization, I would advise contacting these companies (Gowalla, Foursquare, Brightkite, Loopt) and seeing what they recommend, or possibly by going off on your own and offering discounts for mayors / checkins / etc.  You might even consider getting a custom stamp for your business on Gowalla, I won’t go into all of the details on this right now, but trust me, these companies are startups so they are eager for your involvement, just call them.

taboodefinition

In closing, I am sure I am not the only one that these things bother, please comment your thoughts on this. Also, what are some other things that you see that bother you today w/ corporate / organizational use of social media??  I am personally inviting some heavy hitters and experts that I know to contribute to this discussion.  Please feel free to weigh in with any other pet peeves you might have.  I would love to turn this discussion into a podcast at some point soon…

 

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  • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

    I have already had 2 people ask and I won't give up the name of the PR Firm or the client that sparked this discussion. That's not my style, so please don't put me on the spot and ask, I won't tell you. :-)

  • brantc

    I would never advise my clients to violate the terms of use.

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      Good point. Here's a link to Facebook's Terms: http://www.facebook.com/terms.php. See, the thing is though, if someone is advised by a PR or Marketing Firm, they are just going under the assumption that they don't have to know this stuff if they are paying someone else to do it for them. See what I am saying. It's crazy stuff and it threw me for a loop when I found out about this situation but I bet that it goes on more than we think. Look at how many businesses are setup as profiles (people) on Facebook. I am positive that not all of them did this on their own.

  • arlton

    At AETN we are very careful about not having too many thing going on, on these different social networks. For instance, on Facebook we only have 1 Page that all our content, communications, ext. filter through. However, we do have 2 Groups that are for specific projects/events – AETN Quiz Bowl and AETN Foundation (which is its own entity). We recently deleted a group that was created a few years ago that wasn’t being used. It was a generic group for AETN and we felt it was too confusing for visitors to have all these different Groups and Pages to sort through.

    We have tried to see how we could utilized location-based social networking, but there wasn’t enough correlation between what it offers and what we do. Sure, we have events occasionally throughout the year, but not often enough to justify using these location-based social tools.

    Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      Great Points. I totally agree, sometimes less is more.

  • ghidotti

    Great post, Cotton. The company as a Facebook profile is one of my all-time pet peeves when it comes to social media. You would think by now (and with all the thousands of companies that have fan pages), that someone would take notice if they were being asked as a company if they were in a relationship. Baffles me. I also agree on the Geo-Social, but I'll go easy on that one just because I know there are still many, many companies trying to get their heads around this one, including me. But I agree – I have been advising my clients that the best way to use these platforms is to participate with specials and with tips and advice (like with most social media platforms). But I'm still learning …

    Another thing that just really pains me to watch is when a company uses these platforms solely as a marketing arm. I hate it for them because they are going to get zero response from their target audience, but I also hate it because they aren't understanding the true power of all of this stuff. And that's creating TWO-WAY communication with their clients and prospective clients. These platforms give companies unparalleled access to connect with their audiences and learn more about them and their relationship with the company/organization. That is such an exciting opportunity that, unfortunately, many companies (large and small) are missing because they are too busy reminding people of the special of the day.

    So, that's my hope … that we move beyond a purely marketing focus to more of a relationship-building process that allows us to share and create together.

    Oh, and I also would like world peace and a pink BMW.

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      LOL, thanks for your comments. I am so glad you touched on Two-Way communication. Yes, they have to sacrifice a little bit of their time and possibly even give away a few things here and there but in the grand scheme of things, how much is that dialogue w/ your clients worth? Priceless. Best of luck on that pink BMW too! :-)

  • http://aaronreddin.com Aaron Reddin

    I think where many orgs are blowing it right off the bat, is thinking that they can just create an account and then just “blast-off”!

    Last Tuesday I spoke to about 60 people from different NPO's and coalitions who just wanted to know what was in it (SM) for them. No matter how much money they could raise and/or save with the use thereof, they couldn't get past the fact that this whole “networking” idea required a courtship.

    People would rather buy BP than BS right now. Without the time to farm your network, it will dry up and die. Trust me, it's happening to some of mine right now that I've neglected. People want people, and once that connection is made then you can move into integrating your “pitch” to your shared lives.

    Maybe I'm just full of BP…errr…umm…BS, I mean.

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      Very good point. I know of one situation where a company added the responsibility of social media management to an existing persons job description and the whole thing went south in a hurry. It's all about working it and building the relationship, could not agree more! Thanks for the input. :-)

  • http://twitter.com/robertblake Robert A. Blake

    I've had several problems with clients setting up a Facebook profile instead of a Fan page. This was mainly because Facebook didn't have Fan pages yet. However, it is hard to get them to delete the profile once the Fan page is setup and you've suggested your friends to become fans.

    Also, another problem is pricing models from either web firms, PR firms or social media experts. Most clients are confused on what they are getting from one place to the next and just end up not going with anyone and doing it themselves creating these problems.

    Natalie I settled for a silver BMW ;)

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      Yeah I can kind of see them doing it before Fan Pages and now that they have a following not wanting to commit to moving everything over, I can see the hesitation. But, while they keep this going they are running the risk of deletion due to Facebook's Terms of service I would think.

      On the pricing model thing, I think it's sometimes a thing where a company might already have 3 or 4 people who “facebook” or “twitter” a lot and they think they can just rely on these people to do it internally. And, probably sometimes they can, but in the long term they are running a risk if that person becomes disgruntled, etc. I will be the first to admit it's tough to charge a consulting rate for something that is free, it's tough to put a price tag on experience and knowledge and how all of that is rolled in.

      Good points. We need to do this on a podcast soon.

  • http://twitter.com/ARSportsPerform AR SportsPerformance

    Thanks for the insight guys. As a small biz owner, I utilize Twitter & FB to try (operative word “try”) & interact with my athletes & families. I wish I could afford the PR experts like you & your comment-ers!

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      Thanks for your comments. I hope in my post that I didn't come off as saying that there is anything wrong w/ businesses doing their SM marketing internally. You are doing great by the way. :-) The term “experts” is so hard for me to use because the industry (social media) is evolving constantly and if a person that knows a whole lot right now doesn't stay up to date on things, they can easily fall out of touch. A great example of this, and I will call myself onto the carpet about this one is today, I was shown something that I hadn't seen yet involving Gowalla and how they are implementing a follow model for businesses. I would have gotten to this eventually in my reading or through conversations w/ people that i am plugged in with, but it came by way of someone who read this very post and DM'd me the link via Twitter. Something else I have learned is that just about everyone who uses social media well is very open to discussing what they are doing with it. This is extremely advantageous to small businesses who chose the do it yourself approach. Tons of free knowledge. :-)

  • http://twitter.com/bjmaack bjmaack

    Sorry—meant to s

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      LOL, I do the same thing all the time. :-)

  • http://KnowtheNetwork.com Keith

    Obviously I agree with that using Facebook profiles for businesses are not only bad form but severely limit an organizations presence. I used to excuse some of them due to the newness of the platform but these days there is little excuse.

    Location based social networks are a bit more tricky. You are absolutely right that an organization having a “profile” on 4sq/Gowalla is a laughable but sadly I think 4sq is directly contributing to this by promoting “become a friend of History Channel, Bravo, etc..”. It's a horrid idea and it is high time for LBS networks to create a place for brands to exist without “friending” them. I always refer to the old maxim that I don't want to be “friends” with your brand.

    I think it reflects the immaturity of LBS networks and hopefully business will find their place but till then let's not encourage organizations to masquerade as people.

    • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

      Great point on the geo-social immaturity thing, maybe I am being a bit hard on the businesses that have befriended me but it doesn't “feel right” so I called them out. I think a lot is left to be revealed when it comes to this arena, but the whole Facebook thing is just plain wrong. haha. :-)

    • steventrotter

      Agreed on both points. There's no longer an excuse for a business using a profile. They make it easy to create a page. The links are even fairly easy to find now. I will admit that Facebook, for whatever reason, likes to hide their links. And, their knowledge base leaves MUCH to be desired. However, they are growing by leaps and bounds more than anyone else. They have had to push out new technology just to manage the traffic.

      Even with all of this though, it is fairly obvious if you need a profile (person), page (business/organization) or group (and “group” of people who need to communicate via Facebook: community, club, league, etc.).

      As for LBS, again, I agree they are in the awkward teenager phase. They have hit the big league, but not sure where in the big world they belong. Gowalla for sure has 5x more of an idea where they belong and what they are versus Foursquare, but both are still figuring out how to help us help them.

      I have never gotten a friend request from a business on an LBS. I shutter at the very idea of it. ;P

      • http://www.cottonrohrscheib.com Cotton Rohrscheib

        Thanks for the awkward teenager analogy on the LBS, I have to remember that one. ha. I also agree, there for a while it was pretty hard to locate the “build a page” link inside of Facebook, but nowadays every business should have migrated away from their profiles into pages. Just my thought. :0)

        This is going to make for an interesting podcast topic. Don't you think?

  • Joe Jacobs

    Beware of blanket statements guys. This depends on the organization really. At state parks we started with a profile page (that's what their was). I didn't start doing the “fan” page until we had filled up the friends page at 5000. I later entertained the idea of killing the profile page but have found it useful. Those 5000 “friends” have been culled through to get key players (very time consuming but worth it. I still have a lot of work to do on it).

    I now use the profile page to post on affinity pages such as outdoor recreation sites. people on those pages don't know who Joe Jacobs but when I can post as Arkansas State Parks I speak with more authority and also reach more people.

    Of course I promote the “fan/like” page but I use the profile page as a background tool. It is working well for me.

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