5 Scary Social Media Trends

Pity the corporation. In an obdurately unfriendly world, it has to maximize shareholder value.

A little thing like a broken guitar can bust millions in market cap. And batter a reputation as well.

Blame it on social media.

"Social media and the technology behind it—Web 2.0—has forever changed how corporations 'manage' reputation," writes Ogilvy PR's John H. Bell in Corporate Reputation in the "Social Age."

The danger, Bell says, lies in "the explosion of consumer-generated media found in more than 150 million blogs, social networks, consumer opinion sites, video and picture sharing networks, and worldwide message boards."

Five big trends affect how corporations manage their reputations today, Bell believes.

Hypertransparency. With 150 million active social media users, there are "thousands of forensic accountants, social watchdogs and activists watching your company," Bell writes.

Viral crises. When a crisis hits, the word spreads quickly, "often with the accompaniment of YouTube videos."

Demand for dialogue. One-way messaging—news releases, robotic spokesmen, TV ads and customer-service scripts—are out. Conversation is in.

Louder brand detractors and employees. Social media well arms the corporate critic. "It doesn’t take a Goliath to become a formidable adversary for a corporate brand," Bell says.

Uncontrollable brand fans. Even happy customers can blacken your name with their online antics. With friends like this, who needs enemies?

Marketers must be authentic and transparent, Bell says, because "conversation is competing and often winning as a communication channel online."

Trust Busters

Without your Website visitors' trust, you're toast.

Writing for Copyblogger, Barry Feldman lists these nine ways to void visitors' trust:

You're doing all the talking. You offer visitors no opportunity to comment. "When your brand does all the talking on your Website, you’ve got a recipe for distrust," Feldman says.

You’re anti-social. You ignore social media.

You're writing for robots. "Keyword stuffing is a certain mistrust trigger," Feldman says. Write to motivate people, not to drive SEO.

You’re not helpful. Givers earn trust; the needy don't. "In the online world, the most fervent servants have the most loyal friends."

You're never home. Your Website omits contact information.
You’re never wrong. This is the cardinal sin of large companies and TV pundits. Don't commit it, too.

You're a mess. If your Website design stinks, "you’ll never even get the chance to develop trust," Feldman says.

You’re using bad words. Feldman doesn't mean profanities, but "spelling mistakes, poor grammar, blatant bastardizations of the language, clumsy sales pitches, clichés, and jargon-laden nonsense."

You're slimy. You're guilty of using the ultimate trust-busters: bait and switch tactics, fine print, aggressive cookies, fabricated testimonials, privacy policy violations, spam and missing unsubscribe protocols.

"You can’t beg, buy or borrow trust. If you want it, you have to build it one article, podcast, tweet, and headline at a time," Feldman says.

Learn more about building trust from my free white paper, Path of Persuasion.

Social Can't Sell

In The New York Times, tech journalist Stephen Baker recently asked, “Can Social Media Sell Soap?”

His short answer: nope.

Precision targeting, which generates ads "so timely and relevant that you welcome them," has "fueled a market frenzy around social networks," Baker writes.

But social networks are heading for a fall, because social can't sell.

As proof, Baker cites a chilly sales statistic (courtesy of IBM) from last year's Christmas season. 

"On the pivotal opening day of the season, Black Friday, a scant 0.68 percent of online purchases came directly from Facebook," Baker writes. "The number from Twitter was undetectable. Could it be that folks aren’t in a buying mood when hanging out digitally with their friends?"

I think Baker is on to something.

Social can't sell.

That's why the oxymoron "social media marketing" would make George Carlin's list.

Social is unlike traditional media.

When you consume traditional media (newspapers, magazines, radio and TV), you willingly trade your attention for content. 

That means ads are—more or less—welcome.

But in social, ads aren't welcome. 

They're like a telemarketer's cold call in the middle of the family dinner.

CBS Earns a Black Eye

The acerbic well of public trust has been further poisoned.

Last month, CBS executives ordered subsidiary CNET to pull a product from consideration for a "Best of CES" award at the Consumer Electronics Show.

CNET was under contract with the Consumer Electronics Association to judge the competition.

But the executives at CBS didn't like the fact that CNET wanted to give the award to "Hopper," a new product that lets Dish TV subscribers skip commercials. (CBS, in fact, has sued Dish to stop the sale of Hopper.)

“I can never recall any major media company, much less a top-tier First Amendment protector like CBS, publicly mandating an editorial decision based on business interests,” writes Gary Shapiro, CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association, in USA Today.

The decision has destroyed CBS' reputation overnight, Shapiro says.

"CBS, once called the Tiffany network, will never be viewed again as pristine," he writes.

The CBS executives have earned a spot on the Wall of Shame alongside Lance Armstrong, Kenneth Lay, Bernie Madoff and Jack Abramoff.

They've also made marketers' jobs a little harder by adding to the "trust deficit" and strengthening customers' skepticism.

To find an antidote, read my free white paper, Path of Persuasion.

Why I Blog

Rereading George Orwell's 1946 essay Why I Write led me to wonder why I—or anyone—would blog.

"Putting aside the need to earn a living, I think there are four great motives for writing," Orwell says.

Writers want to boost their egos. Writers "desire to seem clever," Orwell says. They share this desire with "the whole top crust of humanity," including scientists, artists, politicians, lawyers, soldiers and businessmen.

Writers want to share their enthusiasm. Writers want to share their perceptions of the world and the pleasure they gain from "words and their right arrangement."

Writers want to record history. Writers hope "to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity."

Writers want to change things. Writers "desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other peoples' idea of the kind of society that they should strive after."

In each writer's case, Orwell says, these motives will fluctuate from time to time; but you'll always find at least one of them driving the efforts.

"So long as I remain alive and well I shall continue to feel strongly about prose style, to love the surface of the earth, and to take a pleasure in solid objects and scraps of useless information," Orwell says. "It is no use trying to suppress that side of myself."