UnMarketing, 2nd Edition

11Social Media (Social Currency as Well)

The problem with the term social media is that whenever people see the word media, they automatically think “push.” Media has been classically linked as a way to push your message out through a variety of methods such as television, newspapers, radio, and online.

However, social media isn't media at all—it is simply a conversation with two or more people. It's an action. Not a site. Social media isn't Twitter. Or Facebook. It isn't the new website flavor of the week. It's the ability to have conversations online with others, whether it is your market, customers, colleagues, or anyone who happens to come across your conversation.

Twitter isn't social media if you use it to just send out ads and blog post updates. That's a glorified RSS feed in 140 characters. You have people every day talking about your market, your industry, and possibly your actual product or service. You choose whether to be part of it, but that won't stop the conversation, and sometimes it will make the overall impact worse if people view you as ignoring an issue. Imagine a room of a thousand of your potential and current customers all talking about you and you choose to go somewhere else. Or even worse, you show up to the party and just hand out flyers, which is what you're doing if you run a Twitter account and only send out ads. The existence of the account makes it look like you want to be part of the conversation, but your actions show otherwise.

Facebook isn't ...