I think in this case, Duncan Watts is wrong. I own his book. So social does work sometimes. :-)
I agree with his statement that SM should start with an experiment, many of them really. Developing strategies that require viral cascades is a recipe for failure.
social media is engagement in my view. many small engagements are like small fires. It is unclear which one will catch. Which message will resonate with our audience. However, if it does, then investing further energy, getting the fire to shift and turn into something larger is possible.
He is right that most agencies can not do this. Nor do clients see much value in small multiple experiments across mediums (sites, technologies, platforms). Some see this as a risk. few see it as an opportunity. The difficulty is shifting resources and being able to kill off projects that have little current value. Most projects in large agencies are priced and resources allocated (most outsourced)long before the project beings; which means agility is lost while risk is managed.
This is actually the benefit of a startup. Being able to track real time metrics, actually creating value and engaging in that creation with their users/buyers/clients shifting resources as needed.
I think the Ted talk about the Why, How, What circles explains very clearly why some campaigns are successful and why most fail. If you are starting at What, you will fail most of the time. If you start from the Why of your product, community, the philosophy and thoughts and beliefs behind it, there is a chance that it will be far more appealing.
That some believe Social Marketing does work and does not work only clarifies that our strategies are poor. Not all TV commercials are culture shaping, nor do all magazine ads shape society, but to assume that they have no impact is a large mistake.
Social marketing works. Just not the way you think.
Good point about how people think about social. They say, "hey let's create a viral campaign," and dump all this money to agencies to create them. When campaigns fail, they say social doesn't work. What they don't get is exactly that, social is an on-going series of experiments, you're basically trying to create something that will get carried on and shared by a number of individual human being. Optimizing to Google's search algorithm is a relatively simple task compared to optimizing your message to one that resonates with hundreds and thousands of human beings.
I disagree with just about everything in this article. Social marketing works and it is measurable.
In my experience, the first step is to gain followers or fans. The best way to do this is through targeted advertising. While it is possible to build a follower base without advertising, it is harder. Advertising gives the advantage of speed and targeting.
The second step is to keep providing people with good content, while at the same time, promoting your product. As you provide content, you can measure the number of comments and get a feel for peoples' thoughts. This becomes easy after a while because you become accustomed to your audience and know what they like.
Does this mean that you are going to be able to sell your product? It really depends on your product and the market, just like with anything else.
I would question the product-market fit before I questioned the value in social marketing.
I don't know about published, but I have been able to measure my campaigns by measuring people's feedback to my posts, clicks on links, total sign-ups, conversions, etc.
Some things work better than others, but there is a definite feedback cycle once you have some followers/fans and provide interesting content.
There is much more to social marketing than "going viral". Even if I can have a conversation with 10 people relatively cheaply and easily, that is still of value. Social marketing is a social exercise, it gives you an immediate proximity to your audience. Just because you're not making a video with a million hits on youtube doesn't mean ur doin it rong, or that it's not having a positive effect on your business.
Social media marketing is quite simple. ^_^ If you trying to put advertisement sections in, say, FB to promote your product - you will fail (FB will just earn your money) but if your product is so good, that several members of some thematic community will recommend it - you will get a huge boost.
That is why, for example, some hotels are always crowded with middle-class tourist while same type hotel next corner is empty and selling rooms to whores.
So, don't advertise crappy brand or service on FB - develop your brand or service first, and then customers will promote you on FB themselves.
I have several ecommerce clients that use Twitter and Facebook for social media efforts. Here's an average of their conversion rates: All Traffic Sources (3.34%), Facebook (2.55%), Twitter (0.23%). Average number of twitter followers: 6,280. Traffic from Twitter is pretty much worthless. In fact, they wouldn't even be using it if it wasn't for Google.
Social media isn't meant for marketing, it's meant for PR.
37Signals doesn't use their blog for marketing they use it for PR and education. This attracts an audience, and once in a while they'll visit SVN on a day they're talking about Highrise and once in a while they'll go see what 37Signals actually does. Even when they launch software like the iPad app it's put in a PR context (we can make a paint prog with ONE color and get lots of sales, you can too!)
If you want to post press releases on your Twitter you will fail, if you want to call out Salesforce as a silly business because of their margins then you will get readers in droves.
If you want to use social media for marketing, buy some ads.
37Signals doesn't use their blog for marketing - really? PR and pseudo-education IS marketing. It is like forex.com "teaching" you some basics of trading.
37signals is actually very simple thing and very common formula - 3 or 4 really smart people(high IQ, well educated in different fields) joining forces.
To be more precise, the modern kind of PR that actually lives up to the "Public Relations" name, not the legacy kind based on control of the message that is fundamentally flawed.
A better title would drop the "Why" because the "why" is not really answered. Indeed, the message of this piece is that we DON'T understand why some messages spread on social network, only that some do and most don't.
