This has been an absolutely incredible year. We’ve been privileged to talk to some household-name companies about PR & Social Media. We’ve even won more than our fair share of FORTUNE-level engagements. (w00t!)
But, as the brand names got bigger, I sometimes caught a whiff of something unsavory in those oaken conference rooms.
I was beginning to smell a rat.
In some select cases we found our prospective clients more interested in paying lip-service to Social Media ideals than in true change. They were looking to mark off the check-box, as in, “Social Media? Yep, we got that.”
Merriam-Webster defines “bastardization” as “(reducing) from a higher to a lower state or condition.” Here’s an example…
One company we talked to had already added basic Social Media elements to their web properties. Permalinks, embed code, even some blogs and remixable multimedia content. At first glance, most any social media schmoe would laud the company’s savvy.
But when we dug deeper, we only saw problems:
- The blogs only spoke to tiny special-interest niches of the brand’s humongous audience…
- Many of the company’s previous forays into Social Media had been both disjointed and blithely abandoned (and yet were still easy to find)…
- The company’s name was being abused by SEO scammers…
- Some of their best stuff was simply hard to find…
Ultimately the company seemed more than happy to allow people to share their content, but was unwilling to do anything to engage with them 1:1.
They didn’t want to be part of the conversation; they wanted to be the topic of the conversation.
We pointed out the difference. We lost. (w00t!)
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Todd,
Interesting. I’ve seen the same thing. I’ve spent two days working with a prospect on a “campaign” before concluding that the best “campaign” was straightforward and honest.
Two days to come up with just talking. It shows how people (heck, just about all of us) have been conditioned to “market” instead of talk.
Have a good holiday.
~Jim
I can relate. I’ve gone into a few pitches that I was extremely excited about, but by the time that I heard “I’m sorry - we’re going with another agency,” all I could think was “Oh, thank GOD.”
Ah, did you really lose? Or did you, just maybe, help someone make progress? I’m sure you can answer differently in each case but the fact that you even had the conversation with them at all is better than nothing…hopefully…right? OK, I’m an optimist.
Social media is less about being selfish and more about pleasing your audience.
Thanks all, for the comments. I know many of ya feel my pain/joy.
Mike, you’re right that we were absolutely delighted to even be invited to the party; it was a victory in itself. But I am still kinda glad that we didn’t win. While the name on the client roster would have been amazing, I fear that behind the scenes, it would have resulted in a lot of bloody foreheads over here, as we kept ramming into brick walls.
Or maybe it’s sour grapes, I dunno.
I’m having the exact same conversations with potential clients here in the UK but several stages back.
They don’t yet have a social media box to tick but they’ve been on Facebook and are getting the bit about lots of people deserting traditional media and interacting in a different way but haven’t got to grips with the ‘different way’ yet.
Can I come and work in the US?!
While it would be best for companies to not only engage the community instead of just sharing, this is still a growing process. Not everyone gets it. Yet. If I don’t understand how medical insurance works, should I not be entitled to have it? We just need to keep plugging away until they do understand. Shel Israel signed a copy of his book for me and wrote in it, “Good luck pushing the rock up the PR mountain.” That rock can roll down, but I won’t stop pushing it. (pretty corny, i know)
Sorry for the client loss, but I learned the hard way early this year that the ones who are disingenuous to the process are the exact ones you don’t want around. There’s something noble about being able to walk away from it and find fortunes elsewhere, which I’m sure you’ll do. Sorry the “loss” comes this time of year though. Holiday downers stink. Keep your head up.
Jason, thanks for the kind words. (But honestly, we’re up 25% this year. I am juuuuust fine!)
Todd, thank you very much for one simple summing up of how brands get it so horribly wrong so often.
Todd - I enjoy your blog a lot, but there’s something that bothers me about this conversation…you state “They didn’t want to be part of the conversation; they wanted to be the topic of the conversation.” If you had said “they wanted to be the topic of the conversation but they didn’t want to be a part of the conversation,” I’d be completely on board…but the other way around? I completely agree that companies that aren’t ready to engage in authentic conversations with their customers shouldn’t touch social media…but if they are ready to engage in these conversations, isn’t it reasonable to assume that they’d be centered on topics associated with the brand?
This seems to be a common idea among many of the influential PR and social media bloggers….Stowe Boyd’s recent response to the Chip Griffin post where he describes the words “messages” and “audiences” as though they’re completely antithetical to the ideas of conversation is an example of that. As a product marketer, I’m not sure what people think we’re supposed to be talking about. If we’re not supposed to want to engage in conversations about our product, what should we be doing?…sit around the conversation hoping that someday someone will say something associated with the product?
Paul, I note and appreciate the distinction. In this particular case, the company didn’t want to be personally involved in the conversation - there would be no “community managers” per se… the company only wanted to ensure that others were speaking *about* them.
To which I say, “blecch.”
However, having been part of the traditional marketing scene for many years, I do hear ya. I have no problem with tapping into Social Media to help “sell more product,” so long as it’s done respectfully, thoughtfully…