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Are we trying to automate the “human” out of social media?

Maddie Grant
January 12, 2012
1 comment

I posted a mini-rant on Google+ the other day, which has led to some great responses and I’d really appreciate your thoughts.  Here’s an excerpt:

“I don’t know yet how to articulate this properly, but if you look at the Altimeter report, and the screenshot of the 5 use cases in particular – where are the people? Where are the relationships? Where is the community building, the unleashing of passionate evangelists, the generative collaboration, the social responsibility? We argue in Humanize – and this is a perfect example – that we’re trying to fit social media management into mechanized processes with predictable inputs and outputs – but social media DOES NOT WORK LIKE THAT. It’s powered by humans. We feel strongly about brands – sometimes – and we don’t give two shits about them at other times. We have opinions like (well, you know) – and then we change our minds. We’re fickle. We want to be involved – and then we want to be involved in something else. But all of that messiness is what makes organizations who can embrace it that much more powerful. ”

Please read the post and let me know what you think.

Are we trying to automate the human out of social media?  Is there a way we could reframe our desire to have a strategy, and to streamline our resources, that takes advantage of the human forces behind social media, instead of trying to find the technologies that cut all of that messiness (and power) out of it?

 

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Mimi Cook

Thanks for pointing out such an integral social media issue! I've been reading through the responses to your rant on Google +, and I'm fascinated by the discussion going on. I believe that the most effective way to approach social media as an organization is as people trying to engage individuals and build relationships, but this should be backed by a solid social media policy. Some organizations may automate their social media interactions out of fear that letting employees interact with customers or constituents on social media may lead to embarrassing or damaging situations. And it can, as even the nonprofit community has experienced. But putting a solid social media policy in place, and making sure employees understand how they should and should not interact, goes a long way towards preventing slip-ups. At the same time, a social media policy can encourage staff members to get out into online social spaces and start building one-on-one relationships. After all, we can't really wait for people to come to us, sometimes we have to reach out to them and start the conversation.

- Mimi

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