IIRC, there was this female (Magda..?) in William Gibson's Pattern Recognition who was employed by an advertising company to do just this for their clients - social/viral marketing at its most grassroots. She'd hang out at bars, clubs and other 'hip' spots, chat up people and subtly hawk the company's wares.
The upshot was that she did this for so long, that she became quite unable to have a normal conversation with people at such places - owing to the lingering suspicion that there might be other such advertising 'plants' like her.
Good read, somewhat unnerving, slightly meh ending..
it spawned a few years ago from a mashup of network marketing and friends.
I realize you probably mean "network marketing and things like it," but it sounds like you mean a mashup of network marketing with the concept of friendship.
From the article: "This is what's happening with most companies' “Social Media Strategy”."
Ouch.
But it is totally true. To my way of thinking a company shouldn't have a Twitter account if it is going to be all business promotion. You have to mix in something interesting to keep subscribers happy.
I disagree. I don't want to hear what some marketing executive is doing with here daughter. Company twitter accounts are usually good inasmuch as they stick to a particular purpose. It's fine if it is commercial or promotional as long as it is clear.
I want to hear if a web service is having server issues, adding new features, experiencing downtime, offering a special promotion. I want o hear if the hardware store is selling something (I want) on sale. If I don't want to know, I'll unsubscribe.
I agree with you to netsp, though, to a degree. I want them to be adding value in the mental space where their product lives in my brain, but not as narrowly as you say here. Relevant links, ideas, events are also good as far as I'm concerned.
The article made me smile too. Bringing the conclusion back to the analogy it sounds like he's recommending the girl from the bank just stop pretending and really be your girlfriend, forget the home loan, meet your parents and I'm not sure where it goes from there.
What I was talking about though is the idea of a 'mix.' That idea basically makes twitter into a baby version of TV. We'll have content which people will want. Then we'll have the promotion which people tolerate to get the content. That doesn't apply very well online and it definitely doesn't apply to twitter.
The problem with twitter when it's a company is not knowing what you are signing up to. I have no problem with promotional content on twitter because I don't have to see it, unless I'm signed up to it in which case I probably do want it.
Having a strategy doesn't mean being fake and uninterested. Anyone who networks with individuals can tell you there's certainly a strategy involved, but to be really good at it you have to also take a genuine interest.
No, that's just faffing around. The difference is that networking isn't about making friends, it's about making mutually beneficial business relationships. What I'm saying is that it's possible to be genuinely interested in someone's business ideas and abilities, and genuinely want them to succeed, and genuinely be willing to put in the effort to help them do that.
Part of the problem is that it's really hard to fully put yourself out there in a way that scales. You could see huge and immediate benefits by running muckwork as 'the derek sivers show,' but sooner or later you're going to run into situations where there are people you don't actually want to be talking to right now and you just wish you could put on the face of 'derek sivers the businessman' to avoid the obligation.
I think that last word is really the key thing, because social media can be insanely powerful in only a few weeks or months, but it comes with all these longterm obligations that can quickly get to be completely overwhelming.
Quite true, but terrible analogy. You want to make a point about the bank, great, but the bank's teller whom you have a crush on is a poor analogy for the bank's social web engagement.
It is hard to balance relationship building with marketing (just as it is hard to draw the line between writing great code and shipping product). That's why some of us get paid to do it.
Companies also have the ability to identify potential customers by researching what someone says on a social network. If a Zappos employee read someone's tweet about having sore feet and was able to recommend a pair of shoes that you would be interested in buying, would that be as big of turn off to you as well?
The upshot was that she did this for so long, that she became quite unable to have a normal conversation with people at such places - owing to the lingering suspicion that there might be other such advertising 'plants' like her.
Good read, somewhat unnerving, slightly meh ending..