Social Media is Old
This provoking statement popped up after reading Robin Hamman's post, 'Social media monitoring - more first step than end game'.
Of course some people start sighing when they hear 'social media' and 'web 2.0'. What's the idea of this new stuff and why should I get into it? Robin quotes his Headshift colleague Lee Bryant saying:
If you look at a longer timeframe, you will see that our new era of social technology and social business is in fact more traditional, and continues very old, resilient models of network-based trade, business and socialisation. The difference is, we now have the technology and infrastructure (and arguably the globalised world) that enables us to scale up these old ways of working to support our modern life.
Robin goes on to say:
In short, consumers can and should be closely involved in the co-creation, testing, reļ¬nement and marketing of products and services - something that nearly always involves a conversation - and social tools are now available to support this.
This is great stuff - and I enjoyed reading the whole post, which isn't just about 'social media monitoring'! It stresses one of the reasons social media appeals to me and so many others: it's back to basics. It's back to what the market is really about: conversation. People asking each other how they can help and earn money by doing stuff for the other.
By the way, this post ends in an open request. Robin is looking for a client "who wants to genuinely involve individuals, members of the public, in what might be described as a circular process...'. What a great way to find new clients!
