renegade element: social media Archives

When things go wrong in social media.

By rb smail on November 4, 2010 11:09 AM | 42 Comments | No TrackBacks

It all started quietly enough. A writer finds her work on a cooking magazine's blog, finds it has also been published in print by them, and contacts the publisher in hopes to get a retraction and a small monetary donation to a group of her choice in lieu of payment. An editor at the publication responds, telling the writer to be grateful they picked it up; it was poorly written and, really, the writer should be paying the editor for work instead. Wow. Really? What's a writer to do?

She writes. She tells her story on her blog. Outraged friends repeat her story in their blogs, and tell other friends, and denounce the magazine on social networks. Someone decides to check Facebook next, only to find the publisher's page there and comment that the magazine steals intellectual property, so that the 313 fans of the page can also see the post.

But wait, there's more.

Continue reading When things go wrong in social media.

Goodbye Cincinnati and #heweb10.

By rb smail on October 11, 2010 3:09 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

I'm sitting in the last session of my Social Media track on Day One of HighEdWeb, listening to one of my favorite people talk about why we tweet, and it's bittersweet. Jeff (@jeffswain) is presenting on Why Do You Tweet? This has been a conversation he's been having with a lot of people, and I'm enjoying listening to him and watching the twitterstream reply to his question. It speaks to the love of my community, and why I adore this particular conference.

Continue reading Goodbye Cincinnati and #heweb10.

Not if, but when.

By rb smail on August 20, 2010 11:53 AM | 1 Comment | No TrackBacks

This showed up in my Twitterstream today, and upon reading it, I realized the social media frenzy really *does* feel like the dot come bubble of the early 80s (yes, I'm that old).

We are in the middle of a social media bubble. Every company is wildly chasing after the promised rewards of social media with very few actually investing and scaling in a sustainable way. Most companies seem to be throwing a grenade of attention, time and money at social media instead of developing an objective, rational battle plan.

The early successes of first-movers in the social space has triggered a mass crusade of companies who have unreasonable targets and bloated expectations.The benefits of simply "doing" social media are showing quickly decreasing returns as the first-mover premium wears off. Innovation in social media marketing and presences is pacing well behind the rate of market saturation, which will lead to a social media space that is too crowded to provide the expected returns of these companies now making significant investments.

The social media bubble will burst when consumers get tired of companies' inauthentic and unoriginal presences and promotions. Consumers don't want to "like" 1000 brands on Facebook, and they don't want read the blog of their local dry cleaners. The market will crash when consumers start ignoring bland, blatant attempts by late-comer companies who are now overloading our social networks and attention streams.

When (not if) the bubble does burst, the market will correct itself and refocus it's potential on the companies that understand the fundamental systems and mechanisms of social media. The companies that were just attracted by the buzz of shiny success stories will bear the brunt of the crash, as they should. And those that spend the time and money in the short-term to invest in a stable, sustainable and value-adding social media presence will emerge to reap the long-term returns.

Why does this resonate with me? Probably because I feel the information stream is becoming more about the buying and selling and marketing of THIS AMAZING ITEM rather than the conversation. There's a place for us all, but I'm not interested in a one way megaphone pitch. Join me for a cup of coffee and listen to what I have to say if you want my attention. In the meantime, I'll wait for the #fail and perhaps then we can talk.

How the social media bubble will burst | Social Media Today

Look at your media. Now look at me.

By rb smail on July 20, 2010 2:06 PM | 3 Comments | No TrackBacks

Okay, let's get this out of the way now. Most of the people reading this post probably will not remember Old Spice as a younger brand. I, however, am that old -- when it was all about showing women daydreaming about Old Spice (although thankfully vintage ads like these were way before my time). In my mind, the operative word in this conversation is old. It's a grandpa scent, like Aqua Velva or English Leather. The product has been around for 73 years, and I for one wouldn't want to have to rebrand that line. A new ad agency took over the account in 2009 and the initial spots, while trying to bring the brand into the present, seemed to be scattered and random. But this year, things are starting to gel; they've found a "man's man" spokesperson with a fabulous delivery and, to add to that, they took a wicked stab into social media and really created some buzz. Here's the initial ad, launched during the February 2010 Super Bowl.

We're not saying this body wash will make your man smell into a romantic millionaire jet fighter pilot, but we are insinuating it.

Continue reading Look at your media. Now look at me.

Signs.

By rb smail on April 21, 2010 10:51 AM | 2 Comments | No TrackBacks

Yesterday, I gave a lightning talk at a brown bag gathering. When they asked me to present, I was told I could talk about anything at all -- as long as I kept it PG (giggle snort). So I decided to give a quick talk on the reasons why people shouldn't be doing social media--because too many people jump in without being willing to commit to the entire concept of conversation and relationship building. The talk went okay, but when I got back to my desk and was tweaking the final version for uploading, I realized that a couple of my flickr images were not creative commons licensed. Ack! So I went back to the drawing board to find alternatives for those images, and I ended up changing them all.

It's as if it were a sign.

Continue reading Signs.

A matter of perspective.

By rb smail on March 19, 2010 11:00 AM | 8 Comments | 1 TrackBack

There are times in your life when you want so very desperately for something to happen, that you get caught up in the emotion of the moment. This is one of those times. I've been quiet on the social media front the second half of this week and I'm sure that it raises a few eyebrows--after all, I'm not what you would call the quiet type. But I've been processing the results of the last several interviews for the social media position for which I've been competing. As much as we all wanted it to happen, in the end they don't believe I'm the right fit for the job.

Continue reading A matter of perspective.

Why do I tweet?

By rb smail on March 4, 2010 3:58 PM | 3 Comments | No TrackBacks

Jeff Swain, my colleague here at ETS, is doing his doctoral research in informal learning spaces and how they influence identity. He's recorded a short video explaining his thoughts, and then he asks for viewers to create--and post--a short reply. It took me over a dozen tries, and while I've given up on short, sweet, and erudite, I've finally captured something in the way of intelligence and posted my thoughts on why I use twitter. Perhaps they are coherent. More likely not. But hey, sometimes that's just how I roll.

And now I ask you -- why do you tweet?

Continue reading Why do I tweet?

No power in the 'verse can stop me.

By rb smail on March 2, 2010 2:49 PM | 5 Comments | No TrackBacks

You haven't seem much of me online today. I've been taking care of business on my end. Of course, you say, but there's always time to drop a tweet or two. True enough. And here I am, whispering in your ear before I go to the next order of business. Because there's a special event this afternoon I'm just dying to tell you about. Remember that job I was applying for involving social media?

I've got an interview for it this afternoon.

Continue reading No power in the 'verse can stop me.

Faceplant.

By rb smail on February 4, 2010 10:49 AM | 3 Comments | No TrackBacks

I have just responded to two blog posts today about different aspects of Facebook. I think it is time I talk about it here. I don't normally address Facebook for a very simple reason.

I hate Facebook. Really.

Facebook, to me, is high school all over again. I was not popular and didn't get to hang with the incrowds. In fact, I was worse than a nerd. I was smart, I moved around a lot, I was always the new kid, and teachers LOVED me. You can't put a bigger "loser" target on someone in high school. So I was basically a loner, always on the outside, and not really interested in looking in.

Thank god I got to graduate and move on.

Continue reading Faceplant.

Timing is everything.

By rb smail on April 15, 2009 6:51 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

I've spoken here at length about my relationship with Twitter. I've been watching it grow and change over the last two years, and continue to see the dynamics shift, depending on what I'm doing and where I'm focusing my interests. Recently, prodded by my partner-in-crime Nikki Massaro Kauffman (@NikkiMK on Twitter), I have expanded my circle to include a cadre of high ed bloggers like @rachelreuben, @bradjward, @KarlynM, @kylejames, @mherzber, and added them to @markgr (an amazing higher ed web professional whom I've actually been following since last year's Web Conference here at Penn State. Plus, he knows my name. So there.). To top off the list, I'd even added @chrisbrogan who is generous in his time, webinars, and sharing information in general. But for a guy who's got 62,555 followers? You watch him work his magic, you don't interfere.

Until today.

Continue reading Timing is everything.

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