The 'R' in Social Media Revolution stands for 'Rubbish'

Next week this blog will turn 3 years old, there has been a change in direction over the past 12 months. Last year I used to speak about social media as a revolution that would change the way businesses would approach marketing! WHAT A LOAD OF RUBBISH!

After working in an agency for a year, I realised that social media will actually be an evolution of the current digital/advertising model. I find there is still to many of these revolutionary spruikers in the blogosphere who are referencing one off social media examples as proof of the revolution! I think what is needed is more people sharing stories about first hand experience on how they overcame barriers (money/legal/administration) and how they integrated social media into their current digital/advertising model.

Revolutionary Social Media spruikers are good for one thing, they help to get people who know nothing about social media excited about the possibility of the technology. However, once this excitement dies down, there needs to be information on what people can actually do.

I guess what I am trying to say is, I am thinking of scraping the name Adspace-Pioneers.blogspot.com and going with the name examples_of_social_media_being_used_in_digital_campaigns_and_other_shit.blogspot.com

23 comments:

tamir berkman said...

wowsers. Welcome to the real world Jules :)

Craig Wilson said...

I agree with you entirely on this Jules. Social media by itself isnt the answer, its just part of the answer. Social media is driving web evolution though and affecting how we think about business and marketing...its just not a magic pill to cure all marketing evils.

On our agency site we encourage people to "join the (r)evolution" because we feel its a mix of the two.

Good post.

Julian Cole said...

Hey Tamir, Does this mean that FrankVizeum will be sharing more case studies beyond the typical agency press release online?

Matt Burgess said...

"I think what is needed is more people sharing stories about first hand experience on how they overcame barriers (money/legal/administration"

Totally agree. You can only read so many times "It's all about communication" before you start replying, "Yes, we get that. But how did you actually get there?".

Looking forward to the "examples_of_social_media_being_used_in_digital_campaigns_and_other_shit.blogspot.com" posts ;)

Age said...

fresh post dude, and congrats on the birthday. here's to many more... :)

Mike Hickinbotham said...

Spot on. In order to move the discussion along we need to listen to the practioners - the people that are giving it a go.

The size and type of organisation (govt, NFP, corp) offers additional insights into the different dynamics you need to understand when it comes to successfully implementating the program.

Julian Cole said...

Hey Age, thanks for the props! I see that you notched up the 3 in September, congrats too!

Matt, 'you need to engage with your consumers' *stab my eyeballs out*! There are to many token lines that need to be deleted from everyones vocabulary! I am looking forwards to owning my new URL!

Craig, exactly! We are not reinvent marketing, we are just adapting to the new change in environment!

Mike, Good point about the organisation specific learnings.

klippy said...

Just another set of tools (along with all the already existing ones) to help you reach your customers.

Also just wondering... do you have too keep the ".blogspot" or can it just be "examples_of_social_media_being_used_in_digital_campaigns.com". if you can choose what are the benefits of staying .blogspot?

Julian Cole said...

Hey Kevin, I would highly recommend that you do not go with .blogspot just go straight to .com. Also make your name as simple as possible, not - examples_of_social_media_being_used_in_digital_campaigns_and shit

If I had my time over again, I would scrap Adspace-Pioneers and have gone with JulianCole.com

Zac Martin said...

Congrats bro. Very "fresh" hehehe.

Stanley Johnson said...

Advertising/brand Communications/Social Media. Call it what you will, it ain't easy. Never has been, never will be.

I think if the last year has taught you anything Jules, it should be that we are all adspace pioneers. We may not always agree with each other, but we are all fighting to do great work and achieve great things.

So please don't change the name of the blog. And never forget you were the one who talked me into Twitter.

Gavin Heaton said...

I think the name still has legs. But I *would* recommend changing URLs. Even if you just do something with the .com domain. The longer you leave it, the harder it will be!

Oh, and congrats on the blog birthday. When most blogs only last three months, three years makes you a veteran ;)

Julian Cole said...

Thanks Stan, I agree we are all trying to do the same thing and make kick arse work!

Gavin, I am too scared to jump URLs, I have worked up to much equity in the blogspot name! I am going to wait till blogspot come up with a solution to transferring backlinks which is recognised by Technorati! :)

Mike Hill said...

Sorry guys but i disagree completely.

I don't know what the future holds but feel that we are well into the social media revolution. Maybe because you are in it, it's hard to see? Think back 10 years.
I'm not talking about a revolution for brands. Quite simply a revolution in how we communicate. It's already happened surely? this post is about 5 years after the event! Blink and you'll miss it type thing...

Don't get me wrong. I can't stand those 'holier than thou, social media twitter will save the world' freaks. I hope I don't sound like one!

Tim Burrowes - Mumbrella said...

I'm with Mike. Soemtimes when you're at the centre of it, you can;t feel how fast thigns are changing.

Please save us from the social media stormtroopers, but that don't mean that nuthin's happening.

Cheers,

Tim - Mumbrella

Ben Shepherd said...

good read jules!

now's the time for the social media experts to stop talking and start showing results.

we can only handle so many meaningless cliches around engaging the consumer/listening to the dialogue/adapting to the new dynamic before many of us want to eat glass.

hopefully some of us will learn there are better ways to raise awareness of your services than saying how redundant all the things that have worked in the past suddenly are.

go cole!

Adam Ferrier said...

Jules,

1. I don't believe you. It's just a sexy headline to get comments.

2. If I did believe you I think you would be wrong (but I don't so you're not).

3. Social media is dramatically changing the landscape and the way people approach brand building. In such a short amount of time too.

4. The social media types who will do well, in my opinion, are those who will find partners who understand the wider marketing landscape. The noisy social-media-is the only-answer-evangelists have sullied their own name by being overly fanatical, rather than the name of social media.

5. Interesting comments thread. Job done Jules.

jefske said...

nice post
good feedback too
this would be a sexy name jules
examples_of_social_media_being_used_in_digital_campaigns_and_other_shit.blogspot.com
a bit long but totally appropriate for u - perhaps u just need to live in tinyURL and twitter away for updates
people should just use Google reader if u ever do decided to update your blog name x

tamir berkman said...

Ouch Jules...and I thought you're reading our blog for case studies: www.frankvizeum.com.au/blog not just online press releases.

Peter Bray said...

When people understand that advertising doesn't work in social media, they will understand that advertising can work with social media.

Con Frantzeskos said...

Agreed Jules.

David said...

Yes mate, you nailed it right there!

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