Innovative Visionary

So last night I was wandering around Twitter when I stumbled onto a tweet that caught my eye.

My first thought was “Wow, that is pretty awesome.” but like a responsible person I actually went to find the data that was used to prove this. Not that I should have been surprised but this was based on 1 data point (you have to scroll to the bottom to get to what they are referring to, I’ll get to how much more ridiculous that makes this in a bit) that the person had been given. They then proceeded to pat themselves on the back and take credit for this. This then got RT’d and RT’d by tons of people, no one even questioning the validity of the statement.

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Loving this site called “WHAT THE FUCK IS MY SOCIAL MEDIA ‘STRATEGY’?” It’s a kindred soul to what we are saying here at Innovative Visionary and I know the fans of what is said here will enjoy it.

http://whatthefuckismysocialmediastrategy.com/index.php

Keep spinning for some great ones. Here is one that it generated that I liked -

Enhance the customer experience by facilitating authentic conversations

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I went through the history and basics of what a Retweet is last post which you can find here. That post was pretty vanilla and boring with all that information and no belittling of stupid people so lets correct that with this one.

The first misuse I want to discuss is using the RT button as a reply. One of the nice features of twitter is that when you hit reply it will actually have a link to that exact tweet you are replying to so your followers can see what your tweet is in reference to. In programs like Hootsuite and Tweetdeck, they can use this information to show whole the conversation right in the client without having to do a bunch of searches or looking at multiple people’s profiles.

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This is going to be one in a series of posts I do about Social Media practices as I see them. While some people will say “There is no right way to do things” or that “Everyone is doing it wrong” I think this is a bit off, and usually used by some to justify doing some pretty annoying things that they know they shouldn’t. I think my buddy Joe Porter said it well when he said, “there is no right way to use twitter, but there is definitely a wrong way.” What I want to do is talk about the why and how things like Retweets are used, how they are commonly misused and what happens because of this.

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It hit me that some people might not get why my name is the Synergizer here on Innovative Visionary. When the idea for this site popped up while talking with a couple locals I decided it would be cool to pick a buzzword that you absolutely hate and use that as your Superhero name. For me that word is synergy.

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I’m still working on a full blown write up on the “experts” of Social Media but I just had to get this post out there while the fire was still hot. That will be coming soon.

You want to be an NBA Superstar. You know what every one of those superstars have in common? A coach who taught them when they were in the 3rd grade. If you want to be a superstar you need to have an awesome coach and I’m that guy. No, none of my kids have gone to the Pro’s but people like myself have had great results. I’ll give you a list and randomly quote them all the time. I’ve read all the big coaches books, Phil Jackson, Coach K, etc. You realize people in the pros are making MILLIONS of dollars. Do you want to miss out on those big dollars because you weren’t willing to invest $99.99 with me to learn how to get to that next level. You have to hire me for my “expertise” because if you are serious about success, I am your “best” answer.

Sorry I couldn’t help with using the sports reference after seeing the word coach repeatedly over the last couple days. Would you trust that guy to take your 3rd grade son to the pros? I know I wouldn’t but this is basically the proposition these “coaches” are making. Sadly there are tons of people who can’t spot this scam and buy into it. These “coaches” will tell you they are “experts” and that their “results” speak for themselves, except either they forget to give you these results they are talking about or the ones they do give are just a giant joke.

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In his many attempts to educate us all The Synegizer has been seen in all of his asshat glory.  He may be brash sometimes but his message is truth.  It may be the blunt,  but it’s the truth none the less.  New to the scene of the Social Media Experts that surround the web I get to throw on a nice new pair of glasses to see the situation different from those who have been so immersed in it since it’s beginning. Some are having a hard time seeing the problems that are staring them right in the face.  What’s the problem you ask as you look for it yourself.  The problem is the agenda held by social media experts.

Now when I tweet or write a blog I do it for one simple reason.  Either I love what I am talking about or I want to educate those on something that I have found.  Now here comes the sticky part.  When someone at a company tweets something or writes a blog about an issue why have they done that?  Is their only concern with the outcome of sharing information the betterment of those they know will see it?  These companies are not running a charity here folks.  They didn’t hire a social media person so all those that follow them can learn about the latest breaking tech news just so they will be educated.  Those businesses have an agenda.  Imagine how the meeting went when it was decided to have a social media presence.  I doubt it went like this – Hey let’s pay someone a salary to tell people things not related to our business so they feel better about themselves.  Heck no!! It went down like this – What can we tell people so that they will eventually see us as the person to come to to buy our products and services.

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To kind of run with this “praise over haze” theme I started with the last post, I decided to give a little of both with this post. While trying to follow a conversation on twitter (because some morons don’t get what a reply is and what a RT is) I happened to have 2 twitter accounts up in front of me. Both of them are sort of in the same business, web design and IT with a little different focus in other areas. What really hit me is how different there accounts were. One of them has really been pushing the “inbound marketing” and “social media” angle lately and in the end I think they were really showing the opposite.

So what I am going to do is a side by side comparison here and see what others takes are on it as well. I have a feel I’m going to get bombarded comments defending the one I’m going to pick on here but here is your warning – I’ve got a lot of built up hate that hasn’t been spewed so if you don’t want to turn into collateral damage you better come with something real or you might turn into the next case of “buzztard who doesn’t get it” with lots of details on why.

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Okay so here is the post to really make you go “WHAT?” I’m actually going to give people props for doing things right overall and looking like they actually get it when it comes to social media and the web. For anyone who only knows me only from Twitter or hasn’t been around me that much in Real Life probably is about to have their mind blown. If you can’t handle it you may want to scroll to the end where I discuss why.

So the first person who receives a “Gets It” is Matt Dollinger. I only became aware of him yesterday through Dave Woodson. The beauty of this is in how I became aware of him and that it came about because of his proper use of Twitter.

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Unfortunately today I’m not in much of a BS mood so you are stuck with just a straight opening and title. There seems to be a serious issue today of what people think it is to “have knowledge” of a subject. While discussing what I feel is a major disconnect with the blogging and social media crowd with someone it’s just becoming more and more clear. This person feels there is value in the creation of “me too” type media where all you do is take and create your own posts based off the posts of others. Now this is fine when there is an actual conversation created from it. Recently a good example of this can be seen in a few of the “Apple vs Adobe” posts out there (sorry don’t have any links on hand but they are out there.)

For many others though, they won’t get to see any of this because there are parasites out there that will leech these stories and contort them for their own gains. This could be to act like they are an expert in the field, or this could be to just steal momentum from the story. They put no effort in understanding the truth behind whatever they are talking about, they are only looking to give the perception that they are authority. It’s to much work for them to actually become an authority on the matter, well, or they are to stupid to actually understand the source material. There is nothing noble about what they are doing because they aren’t qualified in any way to add to the discussion and their motives are personal. In the end all this does is pollute what is out there and lead others who then trust this information astray.

I wish I had a solution for this epidemic but I don’t. I can only call out so many people but the numbers are quite numerous and seem to be growing. As well when you do call out their BS you can’t be assured that all the people who have already been tainted by their foul deceitful tactics will ever see it so they can better understand why this person should not be trusted as a source of information. All I can do is ask for people to call others out when they know they are engaging in this practice. Ignoring them is not enough. This misinformation can spread to others that are clients or higher ups who will then try to force these ideas you and by then it’s to late because they have given that person way more credit then they ever deserved.

But again, their numbers are numerous and always seeming to grow. So maybe the “Social Media Expert” or whatever they want to call themselves tomorrow is the start of Idiocracy but I really hope not.

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