Trepidation, fear, and the red herring

I spend a lot of time talking to people about social media - everyone from social media experts to vendors to companies that deploy it to investment companies.  There are enormous disparities between what I'll call the social media fans (I don't think we've got 'natives' quite yet) and marketers or technology types and everyone else.  From a selfish perspective, this makes my job more difficult as it can be challenging to start a discussion at the right place - I've both bored people and left others completely speechless. But I am starting to wonder if it is a little like the digital divide - will it leave some people disenfranchised? or alternately - is it all fuss over nothing?  Communities - even online communities - have been around for years. What is so different now?

I often tell people that the trepidation that many people seem to have over the 'loss of control' is really a red herring because any sense of control was a figment anyway.  Customers have always controlled the brands they buy.  Cadillac did not go out and market the Escalade to people in the 'hood and yet that is a major market segment...and it has had a major influence on how the SUV is perceived by the entire market.  The same is true internally to organizations - managers may think they have 'control' but employees have always gossiped over the water cooler about issues in companies. 

The real questions are these:
- Do you really want to know what your constituents are saying?
- Are you prepared to respond to your constituents?

Companies are definitely coming around but there remains a lot of people that feel quite threatened by social media.  Are they people that can be won over or will they impede companies from effectively deploying social media? What is your take? 

Comments

[Britt Raybould]

I suspect the threatened feeling you mention is reminiscent of the one movie studios felt when the VCR was introduced. Now, the studios are making as much, if not more, on home movie sales compared to theater ticket sales. And we've come back around to these same businesses wondering how to manage digital downloads, debating DRM and such. There will always be something new to come along that threatens the old guard.

Social media will probably have a similar life cycle. There will still be individuals 20 years after their introduction to social media who won't know anything other than the basics---rather like the owners of all those electronics with the time flashing 12:00.

[Rosie]

People are scared about what they don't understand. Also, I think the fear that the bad reviews will sweep and be eternalized in Google Search engines. Then there are people who just don't "get" it and think it has nothing to do with their business.

I totally agree that it's probably about a loss of control. I like Britt's take on the lifespan of social media. It might become mainstream until a new DVD version comes out.

[Anil]

Hi Rachel, I think you do a wonderful job of articulating that vague fear that social media seems to induce. As Rosie said, it's fear of the unknown. But part of it, too, seems to be not the "what if we fail/screw up?" fear, but "what if we succeed?!"

That's the part of responding to constituents that I think is just as paralyzing for a lot of organizations, maybe even more so than the thought that all their social media efforts will just land with a thud.

And thanks for inspiring a great conversation!

[Rachel Happe]

Thanks for the input everyone - it's an interesting thing to watch and something that has a lot of different factors and contexts but important when we think of deploying social media in an enterprise setting.