It’s the Friday afternoon of Memorial Day weekend. A lot of people have already left the office to start their long weekend. Brilliantly sunny outside and I’m having trouble concentrating on writing about a a serious topic. So I share, in case you haven’t seen it, Social Media Revolution (parody) created by The Poke and @madeupstats.

I have been a fan of Erik Qualman’s Social Media Revolution video since the first time I saw it. It’s a fabulous tool to use in client meetings, presentations and meetings with prospects. Social Media Revolution is short, impactful and the numbers blow your socks off. (Even the numbers in the older version).

I read Erik’s book, Socialnomics, several years ago, enjoyed, found it informative and have recommended it ever since. If you haven’t read the book, what are you waiting for? If you haven’t seen the the original Social Media Revolution, you can find a short version of it here and the most recent and updated version here.

The parody is fun and silly. Certainly, as a Facebook friend commented yesterday, there will be people who see this and use it as evidence to support their dim view of social media in general, social media statistics in particular and who knows what else. There are still many people who do not accept that social media isn’t a fad. Many people, some in influential positions within their organizations, who don’t understand the impact these tools have had, and are having. So many people coming to the web and to social media and social networking every day–for the first time. It’s true.

For the newcomers, the parody video? A parody. Skillfully done and entertaining. I was pleased to see that Erik Qualman had commented that he thought so too.

What do you think? Share it with your networks and see what they say. Do you need help adding social media to your marketing and public relations mix? We can help. Give us a call at 419.740.1262 or email us at info@allenmireles.com.

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And then, take a moment, as I will, in celebration of Memorial Day itself, to give thanks to our nation’s veterans: those who are with us and those who have left us with their memories. We are grateful for your service.

The video Social Media Revolution Parody courtesy of The Poke and @madeupstats

Writer: Will Rolls
Designer/Animator: Iain Armstrong
Producer: Jasper Gibson
Music: ‘Extremity’ – Barrie Gledden / Kes Loy

Statistics show that social media usage among women, and men, of a certain age (read Boomers and older) is climbing rapidly. According to the Pew Internet study of Older Adults and Social Media, Half (47%) of internet users ages 50-64 and one in four (26%) users age 65 and older now use social networking sites. Yet there is a disconnect between the rising usage of social media networks and other tools for personal use and use of those same tools for business.

Baby Boomers, strong in number and loud of voice, are in decision making positions. We are doing much of the hiring, firing and evaluating in businesses and organizations. And somehow, many of us are not making the leap to business usage of social media–yet. In spite of mounting evidence of the efficacy of using social media tools, including social networks, video sharing, blogging and texting, to:

• Increase qualified leads for goods and services
• Improve search engine rankings
• Provide customer service
• Educate
• Innovate
• Organize
• Build relationships with customers, prospects and media
• Increase traffic and exposure
• Develop loyal fans

The term Baby Boomer typically describes men and women born between 1943 and 1962.  Some of us, laughingly prefer to refer to ourselves as being “of a certain age” and we see ourselves as still youthful (still), vibrant and powerful–no matter how we are perceived by everyone else. We are the generation that came up with the Vietnam War, with television, what we now call “snail mail”, the Civil Rights movement, the liberated youth culture, radio and advertising that pushed commercial messages at us in every medium.

The race to be online, to share information, to connect across all boundaries feels alarming to many of us. The fast pace of the changes that take place online can overwhelm. Many of us have reached a certain position in our work and have become accustomed to doing things “the right way”, meaning doing things the way we were trained many years before. We have become skeptical about anything related to marketing or advertising and place great faith in the printed word or the six o’clock news. We are intimidated by the new technology and secretly believe that all this noise about digital this and online that and social whatever is just that: noise. Something the younger kids care about. A fad.

This mindset is not uncommon and takes patience to work with. Just last night a friend and I were commiserating about his frustration with colleagues of our generation, and how they were missing the importance of using social media tools to communicate with their customers during a particularly grueling customer service snafu. He felt that his colleagues were unwilling to move forward and were unwittingly making things harder for themselves.

I am often asked how I, at my age, have become so involved with social media and social networking. How is it I have learned all of this? And why?

I explain to people of my generation that the social networking done online closely resembles offline business networking. That sparks interest. It’s all the same stuff, I tell them. Human beings have not changed so much over thousands of years, I explain. Our instincts and motivations remain the same. We search for information, validation, connection, assistance and entertainment. We share what matters to us and what we find important. And slowly we learn how to use these new tools, how these social media benefit our businesses and organizations.

It is changing. Our world is changing and we are changing with it. Some of us reluctantly, some with great excitement and some of us kicking and screaming. The internet offers us a reflection of our humanity: the good, the bad, and the ugly. We can embrace these powerful tools and use them in both personal and business lives. And if it takes us a little longer to figure it out? No matter. What we bring to the table in terms of life experience and earned wisdom complements the rabid intelligence and high energy of younger generations.

Predictions are for increased us of social media in business. Some expect social media will replace traditional media in the next three to five years. Those of us of a certain age will continue to experiment with social media and social networking in our private lives and, because we want to stay relevant, we will pay attention to how the use of social in business is evolving. We’ll get there.

Do you need help understanding how social media tools can benefit your business or organization? We can help. Call us at 419.740.1262 or shoot us an email at info@allenmireles.com. We love this stuff and we can help integrate the new social tools into your existing marketing and public relations programs.

And I’m your age, so I can help you feel comfortable about taking this on. Follow me on Twitter and you’ll see what I mean.

Check out this video of the “Future Hipsters” for a quick chuckle. I loved it and you may also.

Images courtesy of BOOMBoxNetwork.com and Intel.com

Future Hipster video courtesy of SocialMediaWeek.org 

           Guest Post by Katleen Richardson 

Given the effort that most people put into their marketing strategy, it’s surprising how few people know how to correctly assess how well that strategy is performing.  So many people just stab in the dark, trying one marketing ploy after another in seemingly random fashion, hoping that something will eventually work.  This is a huge waste of time and money, and underlines exactly why having an effective measurement system is so important!

Katleen Richardson of Marketing-Advantedge.com is an experienced leader who builds integrated strategies combining research, data analysis and creative thinking. She has delivered successful solutions for the publishing, financial and telecommunications industries, as well as for conference and training companies, and professional associations. Her approach is to design customer focused, cost-effective solutions based on cross functional collaboration and results-based metrics.

As the world rushes online and accesses the web from their desks and smart phones, managers of businesses and organizations are sitting up and realizing, some to their horror, that this social thing isn’t going away. Neither is this online stuff. The pressure to learn something, add a Facebook page…do something is mounting. Yet most feel like they are already stretched very thin and have little bandwidth to take on what they perceive as an overwhelming task.

So where do you start? At the beginning. (Sorry. It’s true.) The process of adding social media into your marketing and PR mix is like adding any other communications channel in that you follow a process with logical steps:

• Define what you are trying to accomplish (tie into your business or organizational goals)
• Review your existing marketing and PR programs (how does social or online work with your offline and traditional programs?)
• Identify your audience (who are you trying to communicate with or persuade?)
• Evaluate your resources (how much time, personnel and funding do you have? Do you have the support of upper level management?)
• Research to find your audience online (Where are they? What networks are they using and how are they using them?)
• Develop your strategy (make sure to include identification of who is empowered to make decisions regarding any online response to your social activities)
• Establish quantifiable objectives so that you will be able to measure your success
• Train the people who will be working on your social marketing and PR programs
• Implement the programs you have created
• Monitor the social media you are using
• Measure the results of your efforts
• Evaluate (how did the programs help meet your business objectives?)
• Adjust your programs
• Repeat or go back to the beginning and start the process all over again…

Using a logical series of steps will remind you that incorporating social media is not unlike incorporating other communications channels into your marketing mix. However, it brings its own special baggage and you need to be aware of some of the challenges you face.

Listening

You will need to monitor the web for mentions of your company’s name, your employees, your products and services, your competition, your industry and trade organizations–and more. And then you must pay attention to what you learn, because the information may well impact what you are doing, both online and offline. This can be done easily using free monitoring tools like Google Alerts, Twitter Search, or Social Mention or by using some of the many excellent paid monitoring tools including Sysomos, Radian6, and Alterian SM2.

Social Media Policy

Your organization will need to have a social media policy in place if it doesn’t already have one. Your company’s employees are probably all using social media to some degree and may be mentioning your company. You may need to employ your employees to implement and manage your social media and social networking initiatives. In either scenario you have to be able to spell out what is considered acceptable behavior, what information is proprietary and what can be shared. Who is empowered to make decisions or take action on your organization’s behalf? What is the approval process or the chain of command for decision making?

Training and Outsourcing

You may need to train your employees (and you may want to take part in some of the training yourself) in the use of the social media and the social networks that you will be using. You may want to hire outside consultants to help manage your campaigns if your employee base is stretched too thin.

Need Help? Call us.

Does the idea of incorporating social media scare you silly? Do you need help developing a strategy for your social media activities? Or would you like to have your employees trained in using social media for marketing and PR? We can help with all of these things. Give us a call at 419.740.1262 or shoot us an email at info@allenireles.com.