What does a puppy wearing a crown have to do with social media?

Looking for a social media guru? Many of us are. And there seem to be just as many folks who claim to fit the bill: calling themselves “social media guru” right there on their LinkedIn profile, or “social media expert”, or “social media maven”. Some social media gurus even specialize in one service or another, the “LinkedIn expert”, the “Twitter maven” and so on. There’s no shortage.

Cindy is the life of every party now that she's
a Social Media Expert

Full disclosure: I think I know something about social media myself, which is why I created this site. For more about that, see the About page.

The aim of Social Media Reality Check is to take “a candid look at the social media guru’s wardrobe”. The “wardrobe” reference suggests that social media as a business endeavor is all hype and no substance. This is intentional, but I don’t really think it’s true. I think we need a little more dispassionate examination of the facts, and it’s my impression that many others feel the same way.

Many companies – and universities, and non-profit organizations – are jumping on the social media bandwagon. A lot of them are taking a predictable approach: they are hiring, or seeking to hire, someone to be in charge of “social media marketing”, sometimes this involves “community building”, also seen as a form of marketing.

By my guestimate, 90% of companies are looking at social media as a new and (probably) essential part of marketing. As such, they figure they need a social media marketing manager, or at least they need an online marketing manager to handle social media marketing.

I have read some amazing social media marketing manager job descriptions over the past few months. After talking with a new friend and confidant, Kimberly Plumley, I got motivated to put some of my thoughts online where others can read and react to them.

If a company can write a job description that explicitly calls for a “social media marketing expert”, then such a person must exist, right? And whoever is writing the description must know exactly what skills and experience that person will have. But social media marketing has only been around for, oh, two years? Maybe. And, as a “profession”, it has only been around for, I don’t know, six months? How long have there been “social media marketing expert” job descriptions? How many people have the title “Social Media Marketing Manager”? I would like to find out.

That’s where you come in. It’s easy to call yourself an expert, and it’s almost as easy to ridicule those that do. But this doesn’t serve anyone’s best interests.

Let’s take a good look at the emperor. Let’s pull back the curtain, smell the coffee, get real, cut the crap, and insert your truth-telling metaphor here.

I want this site to be a forum. If it gains enough momentum, I will litterally turn it into a forum using BuddyPress forum software. But for now, let’s just have a good, healthy exchange of information and opinion.

Ideally, the discussion will be based on facts. That’s always the tough part. So if you’ve got facts, meaning, for example, documented numbers of people who have been hired as social media marketing managers, then bring ‘em on!

I know one good place to start: Jeremiah Owyang’s blog. If you can think of others, put ‘em down there in the comments along with your thoughts, rants, whatever you like.

Let’s get things rolling.