Unmarketing

Scott Stratten’s hour-long presentation on what Social Media is really about – social, aka relationship – is one of the best I’ve seen on the subject.

My favourite points:

1. The opening story on customer service. No matter how advanced we get with Social Media frameworks, so many businesses are still getting the most basic customer service horribly wrong.
2. Automated tweets fail because they are pretending to be present – and the most important thing about Social Media is the reply, which you can’t do from an automated tweet.
3. “Social Media doesn’t change the fact that relationships take time.”
4. Every line of information you ask for on an online form decreases the chance of someone filling it by 10–30%. Think about how many fields your forms have.
5. Volume doesn’t work. Value does. Stratten spent years doing the volume game on Twitter and now regrets it.
6. Create great content on Twitter. Craft useful 120-character tweets rather than just sending updates. That’s what being an Active Authority looks like.