Technically there’s nothing wrong with using the term “social media.” But it’s one of those terms that, unless you’re immersed in it, is cursed with being relegated to marketing buzzword. A word spread like verbal wallpaper to covering every marketing or promotion discussion just to impress. Even people, who don’t understand it, throw it around liberally for fear of being seen as out of touch.

Problem with buzzwords, they become empty shells. In business that often means a mindlessly used cliché (see “data points,” “Paradigm” and “out-of-the-box”). Or become business speak, so broad, that it becomes an ambiguous cloud for tools and tactics of social media (Social bookmarks, etc.). And once inside the cloud, strategic understanding and value gets lost.
What message gets lost most: that “social media” is indeed different. As a result, some firms see it as merely another (and seemingly cheap) venue for pushing their currently crafted static advertising messages. This instead of seeing the marvelous technology as the platform in which to market a client’s personality.

Why? When many hear the word “social” in social media, they interpret it as just another audience segment. “A place with people.” In other words, an audience merely to funnel a message to.  Not a social venue for interaction. Visceral connection.

That’s a big problem for many marketing firms and companies that try to use social media.
Traditional advertising is a platform that markets a message. Social media is a platform that markets personality. The “sell” is the relationship. It’s not as much about whether your product is good; it is a referendum on whether YOU THE COMMUNICATOR are good.  It why companies using social media are finding out other things about their company matter in the earned media realm: Political affiliations, corporate responsibility, customer service. They are being evaluated as the sum of their corporate experience. Not by one crafted and clever branding message thrown down the social media well.

It’s about engagement.

But I use that word with some pause, too. Using the word “engagement” to help give clients direction in social media is like explaining how to kiss someone with direction like, “apply stimulative pressure against the rictus.”  Obscure. Just say, “kiss with passion.”  I get it. And in social media, people will get it faster and feel what to do rather than act mechanically when you think give emotional-minded guidance.

So drop “engagement” (until you are measuring engagement). Think marketing personality.  Be interesting. Act and communicate in a way that makes people feel you are in line with the values and idea you communicate.

Next marketing post: Why personality marketing is hard for companies.