September 19, 2006

I talk a lot about Social Networks here.  I think they're extremely important to marketers, because they hold the key to future consumers and marketers (and are the people who will run the world when we're all old...)  I ran across a great post by Sean Carton (I'd include his bio link here, but it's broken) on the ClickZ Network (one of my favorites) on the dangers of inauthentic behavior in Social Network marketing. 

What marketers don't seem to realize is that people in the 16-29 year old range can smell fakery (or will quickly discover it) a mile away.  Why do we think we can get away with "play characters" or fake personas as we market to such media savvy, technically savvy people?  What on earth are we thinking?  And who is consulting with the dopes in corporate marketing organizations who rely on "industry experts" to guide them through marketing in this new medium? 

It's amazing to me that we raise our children to know the difference between truth and lying, yet we market to them in their own hangouts in a false manner.  What are we thinking? 

Read Sean's article.  Click on his reference links.  Learn something about how not to market to the future leaders of the world.

Posted by at September 19, 2006

Comments

Elmir email - www.getelectricalunits.com/

Great article. The author has touched Lonelygirl15 phenomenon. You know what? I don't feel that bad about it. It's actually kind of a cool idea, to take the format of nonfiction videoblogs and create fiction with it. A thumbs up to the lonelygirl15 team

Christi email -

Marketers continuously have to come up with NEW and INNOVATIVE ways to promote products to this oh-so-hard-to-reach demographic. This age group (myself included)resents being told what to buy or what to like, and we have spent a large part of our lives perceptually blocking annoying marketing messages. This being said, you can't blame the social media marketers for trying to reach us on our level, just as you can't blame them for planting products in tv shows to combat Tivo. I don't think they were ever trying to fool us; I think they were trying to get to us. I'm sure the first MySpace marketer was on to something good, unfortunately, the copy cats killed the cool factor and ruined it for everyone. My word of advice to marketers: keep inventing, if someone else is already doing it, go back to the drawing board and come up with something better. And whatever you do, DON'T underestimate us.

Elizabeth Wood Rodgers email -

I was happy to read an article about this. When Facebook created the "News Feed," no one like it and it made a lot of people want to get off. It is important to respect people's privacy, but yet when everyone is joining the bandwagon and joining all Internet sites like MySpace and Facebook, it is hard to not be nosy because of the standard. Even if you are on one of these websites, you should respect other people and be in control of what you are doing. Or it could get out of control.

Rachel S email -

What an interesting blog post by Sean. I decided a long time ago that I would not join the myspace revolution, simply for the fact that anyone could get on it. I did decide to join the facebook, and when I first signed on about a year ago I thought it was so neat. It was just college networks, a way to keep in touch with friends from highschool, and a way to see what was going on with college friends that I had lost touch with. Now however, facebook has opened up their services to high school students, and it is a big turn off to a lot of college students. There were also rumors going around that facebook was going to let corporate giants on the facebook, a huge petition went out saying that facebook wasn't myspace for a reason. The backlash was so bad that the makers of facebook went on the Today Show and made a public apology. I understand why marketers want to reach my age group using new social media. However, my age group has grown up around the media, and we have also been taught not to believe everything we hear. So when the cheesy Burger King man shows up on the television and then in my myspace account I would get a little annoyed. I understand that marketers find it hard to market to an age group of 18-26, but my best advice to them would be, think back to when they were 18-26. As my mom says, the players chance, but the game stays the same.

Rachel S email -

This was an interesting article by Sean. I understand that it is very hard to market to people that around young adults, they are up and coming in the business world, however they don't have a lot of money...yet! Social media is a great way to reach an audience, but do it in a mature way. The burger king mascot being my friend on myspace does not make me want to go out and get a burger. I think too often marketers treat my age group like children, something we resent. We also do not respond to marketing like generations before us. We have grown up with commercials and being blasted by advertising every turn we take. We have become immune to it, and we can catch the gimmicks from a mile away. When myspace first came out I am sure that it was an ingenious marketing tool. But even as I type this post someone is coming up with the next big thing. The marketers job should be to find out the next big thing before it even becomes the next big thing.

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