Doing a Social Media 180
My brother in law was not sure what the fuss was all about. When I told him he said, why are you so pissed off if Oprah or Ashton are on this Twitter, what the heck is this twitter thing anyway. He had just joined Facebook and trying to locate old friends, I was tweeting about the end of the world over the CNN vs Ashton fight. But lets park that for a second.
At blogworld expo 2008, I sat in the audience and listened to many panelists, one of them was Scott Monty. At the time, I had only known him from Twitter as the Ford guy. I did not know of anyone at GM, Honda, Toyota, etc… Over time as someone who follows Scott, I have learned a lot of from him, had the odd twitter exchange, even an email exchange once. Above all I just known him as a stand up guy, smart, articulate, social media pro, and yes yes yes, the Ford guy.
Today, @abarcelos tweeted the following
Q3. UR always a personal brand in people’s minds, especially after engaging (I think @scottmonty =Ford). It’s natural in people. #brandchat
We had a few exchanges on this and my point is this on social media folks, especially those who are brand ambassadors such as Scott. What if Scott left Ford, would @scottmonty still = Ford? Would his replacement = Ford? What if Scott went to Kraft, can he now = Kraft, can he do a social media 180 and become @scottmonty = GM ?
Lets start with the easy one first.
Can @someOneElse = Ford. I agree with @abarcelos “people will leave companies. Everyone is replaceable.” And yes with a proper transition, some one can. They need to establish trust and a style with the community, but yes why not.
Can @scottmonty = Kraft. Yes Scott is already established and is trusted, and advocating a new brand may very well be well received.
Can @scottmonty = GM, (and I am not saying he would) I would say tough, I dont see it, that is a total 180 turn, I mean one day you are advocating for a company the next your advocating for a competitor. Isn’t social media about some level of trust? It will take a lot of time an convincing
At the end of the day who cares any way. Sure if a high profile social media personality left their company to any other their circle of followers will be buzzing, Twitterers will Tweet for a few days, some will justify and study the move some will criticize but in the end they will move on, probably by the time Friday comes along everyone is busy polluting twitter with #followfriday tweets in an attempt to gain another follower.
Beyond that, would the average person care or know? Would my brother in law who is just looking for old friends on Facebook know that a brands social media advocate moved? Would they care?
I say no one cares, What do you think?
I liked our exchange today Samer because it really made me think. You had an excellent point about a well-known social media person at a brand potentially leaving the company and going to another brand. How would the world now view that same person and new brand they’re representing? Would people say, “He/she was great at the last company and really enriched the brand, let’s see what they can do for this one?” or “I don’t know if I can easily accept the fact that this person who represented Brand A is now representing Brand B, especially if it’s a competitor.”
So I thought about it by going back to “life before social media.” People leave companies all the time as I said. Some cannot work for competitors due to non-compete agreements they signed with the companies. Others cannot disclose “company secrets” with non-disclosure agreements. How does it work now that social media is in the mix? Well the major difference is you’re out in the open being seen and heard by all. More than ever people can get to know you, how you engage/interact with people and what you say about your company or in general. This creates a certain perception and bam, you’re that brand. We see and even interact with people from Dell, Kodak, Comcast and other brands on social networks and at the end of the day they are people (who represent these companies) like us.
One thing we both agreed on strongly was that if you’re a new person at a new brand, you have to earn trust for yourself and the brand. A case in point is, I started a position at a company six months ago and didn’t just walk into this position easily. It was a newly created position for me in a traditional, conservative environment. No one knew who I was and what I did. It’s a continuouos education process, tough at times, but like anything you have to persevere and prove yourself to earn respect.
In the end, it really is a personal decision. Unfortunately, I do not know any folks who formerly represented a prominent brand and went to a new one but would love to get their point of view. Let’s hope we do.
You are right. This all gets forgotten in the end (Tiger who? ha).
Thanks for blogging about this point. It’s a great one.