A new-media consultant reviews Paul Gillin's "The New Influencers: A Marketer's Guide to the New Social Media."
Around the third year of my PR career, I had the great fortune of meeting British technology marketer Greville Commins, who was working with STMicroelectronics at the time. (Greville now helms his own consultancy, Varoom.) He joined me on a U.S. press tour in 1999 in support of a joint launch with my then-client, Hitachi Semiconductor.
Greville frequently brought his sleek micronotebook/tablet hybrid to meetings, a Vadem Clio that ran an early version of Microsoft's Windows CE mobile operating system. Since the Clio was just introduced that year, few people owned or had even saw such a device at the time. Thus, the Clio frequently inspired gosh-and-wow at various stops on the tour.
When offhandedly asked by a journalist what he thought of the Clio and Windows CE, the enviably quick-with-a-quip Greville responded, "Well, it'll be great once it's finished!"
One gets the same feeling having read "The New Influencers: A Marketer's Guide to the New Social Media," by veteran technology observer and editor Paul Gillin.
Sympathy for Sisyphus
Don't misunderstand me: Even the best books presuming to tackle the topic of social media can only rise to the level of "work in progress." Thus, I certainly admire the labor that Mr. Gillin undertook with "Influencers," as writing a book about such a dynamic topic is a task that would've set the mythical Sysyphus to thinking the whole rock-and-hill gig ain't all that bad.
In the time it takes to send the final layouts to the printer, a new social media star is born, a new must-use web app is launched in invitation-only beta, and at least six startup CEOs have wrung their hands arthritic over something involving TechCrunch (e.g., either the fact that they aren't in it or, perhaps, the fact that they actually are).
The book starts with a refreshing kind of humility that is, frankly, a dreadfully rare thing in the Web 2.0 marketing business. Mr. Gillin admits that, in December 2003, he figured that "Blogging's wave has already crested, now that millions of online diarists are realizing that not that many people actually read this stuff." We've all had our "world market for about five computers" moment. Few of us are willing to admit it. Fewer still have the stones to start off a book that way.
"Influencers" definitely has the right parts, containing all of the necessary talking heads, anecdotes, tips, tricks and forewarnings. Sure, it scares you to attention early on with the obligatory brand-death-online tale (Vincent Ferrari's famous recorded attempt to cancel his AOL account), but it positively excels in highlighting the opportunities that open up when the responsible marketer is exposed to social media. This is highly important since far too many corporations (and consultants that sell marketing services to them) focus solely on the threats, based on the specious notion that online communities only exist to set up drumhead courts and deliver summary justice.
Who's doing it right?
To illustrate these opportunities, "Influencers" is chockablock with stories of how ordinary people have done extraordinary things with what Forbes' Daniel Lyons once referred to as "the cheap revolution" in an article. (Incidentally, Lyons is somewhat called to task for his infamous "Attack Of The Blogs" screed. Rightly so, I believe.) There's Mike Kaltschnee's HackingNetflix and how the corporate object of his online affection was unsure how to handle such a suddenly powerful enthusiast. On the podcasting side, there's the HT Guys -- Ara Derdarian and Braden Russell -- delivering "no noise, all signal" to thousands of home theater fanatics.
"Influencers" is equally generous in terms of highlighting those corporations that have successfully used social media to create what are (at least today, anyway) differentiating bonds with the various constituencies that matter most to their businesses. Here, Mr. Gillin is careful to examine corporate online voices both big (GM, Benetton) and small (English Cut, Butler Sheetmetal).
The clear message in all of this mirrors what I've frequently told audiences at various communications industry conferences: that successful corporate engagement in social media is not "rocket science," but is rather more like "brain surgery." In other words, the technology is the easiest part, but companies need to dig deep into their own inner workings to reinvent and adapt how they communicate in order to succeed in the new media environment.
There are also plenty of hints and tips for behaving like a good online citizen, such as linking generously, remaining transparent, commenting on other's sites, being responsive and so on.
Next: A few rotten apples