Social Media for the MV industry – Part 5

Man, this is the gift that keeps on giving… Part 5? Really? Well as I said before, I’m just trying to keep everything in one spot. I think I’m talked-out on this one. This is a response to a recent forum discussion with mostly a recap.

If you’re just stumbling on this blog posting, it might help to start at Part 1.

From: Symeon Breen: Marketing has always been about “multiple ways to do predominantly the same thing” you have a newspaper campaign, poster campaign, radio, tv, cpc ads, web banners, cold calling etc, these are just some more.

From: Bill Haskett: That isn’t mostly true if you’re a small business. … In a small business, there isn’t such a redundancy of resources that these decisions don’t matter.

And that brings us back to one of my main points. Small businesses generally make the decision that TV ads are too expensive and don’t provide enough ROI. There’s a decision process going on there. Most companies these days have re-evaluated the ROI for newspaper, radio, and other media. This is an on-going process. One could argue that business cards are also a thing of the past, no longer providing enough value to justify the cost. These days people think “social media” and think “ugh, what a waste”. But that’s not a business decision about ROI, that’s a kneejerk, visceral reaction about how social media is currently abused in the social context.

This whole initiative of mine has been to encourage people here to evaluate these resources for three types of ROI (investment being your time):

1. I’m interested in getting more MV developer/colleagues to recognize media as a way of exchanging more information about technical matters faster. I want to share tech notes and get tech details faster than a forum, and without bothering a thousand people who may not be interested.
2. With greater awareness of the utility of these media outside of the “social” context, I think companies that serve this MV industry stand to improve their presence through these media – at no cost compared to the few for-fee options that we have available. Robert Houben discussed this in an interview recently:
3. When social media networks as a development platform are as commonly understood as the green screen and now the web page, MV developers can re-assert their value to their companies by interfacing MV systems with these media to provide new value to consumers in a media that they are likely to use. Remember, this isn’t about what We use, it’s about what They use.

It’s not just a bunch of jabber out there – companies are strategically building into these platforms for interactive marketing and services with an involved consumer audience. Those that are making this leap are improving the value of their brand. Don’t snub your nose at this like Pick people did in the 90’s with email and websites, and how they have been doing it in recent years with mobile devices. Embrace it. Be a part of it. Use it as just another vehicle for paying your bills. What else are we here for?