.jpg)
As consumers like me struggle to get the best use out of social media, marketers need to show us the value.
Since I work in the interactive industry, I realized a while back that I need to get interactive. That is, get involved with social networks. So I joined LinkedIn first, before Facebook was open to the public and MySpace was the rage. I thought it would be useful for keeping track of contacts.
When I published my children's book, I created a MySpace page (I thought I HAD to for marketing purposes). And when Facebook became available, I created a profile there as well, as did many of my colleagues.
Since then, I have been invited by friends and work associates to join Bebo, Plaxo and Friendster, as well as niche sites like JacketFlap and Lookybook. I think there might be others -- I've lost track.
But has joining all of these social networks enriched my life or made it any easier?
For the most part, I must say no.
I have used LinkedIn to look up sources for articles and be introduced to a potential writer or two. Plaxo reminded me of a PR person's birthday so I could send a note, probably scoring me a few points with her. Most of the activity on my MySpace page has been posted from a friend of mine in a band, promoting his gigs and TV appearances.
As for Facebook, it just frustrates me. Wanting to be a participant, I've tried to answer questions posted by "friends" and take part in some of the activities offered up to me, such as Likeness surveys and sharing my musical tastes. Every time I try, I end up screaming at my screen -- I take the time to go through the exercise, only to get an error at the end and realize my information hasn't been sent.
Clearly, I'm not the demographic drawn to social networks (although I'm not revealing my age), but I do consider myself pretty technologically savvy and open to new things. Still, I don't get the value of social networks.
People I want to keep in touch with, I keep in touch with -- via email, phone calls, in person (a novel concept, I know). And I don't really need to know that the person who wrote an article for me once last year is walking her dog today or visiting Boston with her boyfriend. That's just too much information.
Okay, social platforms can provide entertainment (when the applications work), I'll concede to that. But are they that useful as a tool?
As I was writing this article and contemplating the answer, Fast Company actually asked a similar question on its blog: "Facebook: More of a toy to use in your leisure time or more of a tool to communicate?"
The comments were varied, ranging from someone saying it's "a toy for the majority of business users at the moment," to someone else providing advice on how to harness Facebook to get feedback from customers. The majority of people who responded, however, said they see the potential of it as a business tool think it's mostly used as a toy at this point.
Speaking of toys, that's how I would classify virtual worlds as well, although to me, they're even less entertaining. After writing an article for iMedia about a virtual world for kids, I thought I'd take my son there. Maybe it just wasn't populated enough yet, but both of us found it extremely boring. His little avatar walked around the room, said a few canned phrases to other seemingly lost avatars, and that was about it. Huh?
So, how should marketers be addressing someone like me in social media? Should they try to engage me from the tool aspect, toy aspect, or somewhere in-between?