@wadds Totally agree about the backlash

@david Too true

@Claire – great point, originally I started this post with two extra questions, but then decided it would have more impact if I stuck to one. The missing question was “What social media mistakes have you made?”

You wouldn’t learn to drive with someone who doesn’t have a license so why do so many companies employ agencies to do something they have little or no experience in doing? I suppose there must be quite a few agencies that employe better salespeople than they do practitioners.

@Craig – Communicator is only part of what public relations does so I’d argue it’s too narrow a term.

@Michelle – Strongly disagree with you. Our first Twitter case study is from early 2007 and by today’s standards wasn’t very good. We’ve other since, some good, some not so. The medium isn’t that young, it’s just that too many people came to it so late. There’s also how those who who get too excited about how earth shattering it all is, when in fact it isn’t that different to what some of us did 20 years when I first started. Two way communication, listen, learn, conversation – none of that is new, social media simply makes it more visible and easier.

As such, until we get companies fully committed to social media strategies we won’t be able to generate case studies. And, as the medium is still so young I think if organisations trust their agencies and PR folk they can learn together.

Claire’s point is a very valid one. I know that in the years – both personally and professionally – I’ve made some howlers, but they’ve been made and I learned a lot from them and that means those mistakes won’t happen to clients.

Having said that, I think there’s an element of always learning – but that’s true of any communications – but you don’t want clients thinking you’re learning on their watch.

I’d point to agencies like AKQA whose digital creative such as the Fiat Eco Drive community is driven around an understanding of data rather than an understanding of PR, yet this is a pretty sociable idea that has spawned some pretty impressive conversations.

There are also agencies like Anomaly and Zeus Jones whose business models are very interesting and lend themselves to creating ideas they develop for/with the client that begin to open up ‘marketing as a service’ – developing ‘stuff’ people need/want which is useful and that would inherently lead to conversation, brand affinity and maybe even advocacy.

Certainly you’d want some PR support on driving awareness around these ideas- but how much easier is a PR ‘pitch’ when you know you have something that you know will be well received by the person you are ‘outreaching’ too? Although it’s important to understand the etiquette within social media by walking the walk ourselves as consultants in this space, if we or our clients don’t have anything to say that we think would excite the people we need to talk to, we have to revisit the creative.

After showing me you walk the talk and have experience in ‘doing’ social media, perhaps if I were a client I’d want the next few slides to show me you understand my consumers and that you understand their behaviour in this new world… you might even have an idea…

(I would just caveat that to increasingly come up with good creative ideas in this space, we DO need to be walking the walk to stimulate new thinking).