norio fujikawa .... chokaku.
Complete Project:
in this next phase of social media... some serious creativity is going to be needed.
I think about this a lot. Probably more than I should be... A few days ago, I went on a really big rant about the Social Media Experts that are champions in the space, and in my "ranting" I was hoping that my message was loud and clear...
"Social Media is not the top layer of a marketing strategy..."
Though this may be a simple and pretty straightforward idea, I am finding (based on comments and coffee house conversations...) that it's NOT so "straightforward" at all. And when I use the analogy of a restaurant owner becoming his/her own word of mouth engine, I had this belief that the realization of how backwards this was, would make my point clear... But apparently it's not making this idea clear at all.
In this next phase of social media, OR whatever we call it, because I really think that in the next 6 - 12 months we will have a better understanding of what is REALLY going on and we will no longer associate "media" with the "social" context of what we are doing as "social mavericks". I really think that we will completely redefine our actions, and in this "redefinition" we will start seeing the social space in entirely new ways.
Jeff Pulver, someone that I admire and absolutely LOVE his work, is really, really close to what I feel the social space is all about ... The "Right Now Web". SO from this point on, that's what am going to start calling the space ... This is totally personal and it's totally conscious, BECAUSE when I think about "social media" in the context of being the "Right Now Web" I can put the "Right Now Web" in it's proper place. I can ask one question ...
"What is it that brands need "Right Now", that I can get from the "Right Now Web"... ???"
Some serious creativity is going to need to be leveraged to help brands leverage the "Right Now Web" because the whole "Right Now" piece is very transparent and very vulnerable. For instance ... Does a Restauranteur REALLY want to know RIGHT NOW what his/her patrons think about their filet mignon? Does the service clerk at American Airlines REALLY want to know what the last person she serviced thought about her? REALLY??? And though the thought of knowing RIGHT NOW may seem a bit scary, is it not part of the marketing mix to gather information that can be leveraged to strengthen brand message? So.. We need some "Right Now Web Strategist", people who can help brands leverage conversations. Right now conversation conversions...
So some serious creativity is going to have to be deployed to help brands integrate "Right Now Web" strategy with marketing initiatives. When we start thinking about permission marketing (Seth Godin) and trust (Chris Brogran) we should start seeing a much more dynamic picture of what marketing will look like as we move forward.





