6 Questions for a Social Media Skeptic

Recently, I found that I had a big detractor in my comment thread, a social technologist named Louis D. LoPresti, who has written an in ebook which he questions the prevailing wisdom about social media. Put simply, Lou doesn’t drink the Kool-Aid. He has worked as a strategist for some well known brands but remains skeptical that social media will prove as big an employer or as major an economic engine as many are saying. He also thinks that much of what you find written on sites like Linkedin or ClickZ is more assertion than proof.

He may be right.

In any case, I like it when people disagree with me, so I reached out to him to get his opinion on a few things, and I thought I’d share.

What’s wrong with people writing articles that tell brands what to do with social media?

Social media is still in its infancy. A lot of the people writing about it are self-appointed prophets. They make authoritative statements and promises, just like earlier "experts" have about every other innovation. So I’d say to be cautious about what you read about social media. It can be a wonderful tool to engage with the world—after all, engaging with one another is the primary purpose of social media. But you’ll also find plenty of speculation, rampant enthusiasm, and unfounded predictions about its boundless capacity to make things happen. In my view, a healthy skepticism about any kind of technology bubble is required.

Fair enough. So who should we listen to?

You have to choose your propaganda wisely. Seriously, it’s not easy. Make sure you deal with people who are down-to-earth about what these tools can and cannot do. Work with people who are clear about their limitations. If they tell you anything is possible, go elsewhere. Don't believe the hype.

What do brands actually need to know about social media?

People are in social environments primarily to interact and socialize. They are not primarily there to buy. This reality has a negative impact on marketing efforts that are intrusive or too overt. Knowing the relevance of your content not just to brand but to audience is key. Content has to be put in the right context. And it takes a good deal of thought to do this really well.

I also think there’s an overemphasis on certain metrics. It's not really about how many people click, like, and follow you. What matters is how well, and by that, I mean, how authentically, you communicate (and emphasize) what is meaningful to consumers. Period. If users believe you, they will come. To do this well, you must investigate how your efforts in this space are different from what other people do, or from what you may be doing elsewhere.

Now you sound like a social media expert. So let’s flip it around, what can social media do for good?

We can see clearly that social media is having a truly liberating effect on the world. Perhaps that is all that it needs to be. One only need look at the simple fact that the State Department itself kept Twitter up and running during the political crisis in Iran. What does this say? It screams that people want to communicate openly and freely with one another, particularly when they are combined as empowered groups. Employees, be they auto workers in Detroit or agricultural workers in India, can become empowered groups. Social can give them better training, more credit, and more autonomy. And it becomes especially powerful if leaders can use it to cultivate a sense of people as human beings and not only as employees or customers.

You don’t sound like a skeptic now. Are you?

Actually, people often accuse me (and people like me) of unrealistically big thinking. I am happy to plead guilty to that charge. The primary concern I have is that we don't ever lose sight of the human-centric elements of technology.

Where are we headed?

On a macro-economic level, I think we are headed into a period of greater and more potent exercise of autonomy, from which we hope to see greater productivity and more sustainable and ethical profit margins. In the same way that the Industrial Revolution was driven forward by steam engines, railroads and mass production, so too mass collaboration, open-community, and open-leadership systems will emerge as integral parts of the corporate economy in the next 5-10 years.

You can check out Louis’s site at: http://quodfatum.com/. And let us know what you think…