Social Media Marketing For Dummies, 2nd Edition

Figuring Out Why You Need a SMM Voice

As we write this chapter, the United States, and indeed the entire world, is in a major economic downturn. Practically every major corporation has had to lay off employees and ask their remaining employees to take on more responsibility. In this economic environment, does it make sense to introduce a new type of role into your organization with potentially overlapping responsibilities? On the surface, it may not appear so, but it’s actually more important than ever. If the economic downturn has taught us one thing, it’s that consumers are tired of engaging with large, impersonal brands and often turn against them on the social web. They simply do not trust big brands anymore. In fact, half of the respondents to a survey conducted recently by The Economist magazine said that the economic crisis has intensified their distrust of big business. The magazine went on to say that the downturn is accelerating the use of social media because people are placing more value on the recommendations of their friends than they are in big business. According to the 2011 Edelman Trust Barometer, trust in business increased 2 percentage points from 2010 to 2011 (from 54 percent to 56 percent). This is just another point on how trust in big business has not bounced back from the downturn. The stock market gyrations in markets around the world should indicate to everyone that people are scared and confused.

If you run a business trying to reach consumers in the ...