One Man’s Recession is Another Man’s Profit
UPDATE: Ed Lee left a comment and I encourage you to check out this post of his that hits on one of the predictions below.
The social media army is a buzz with this terrific new report from Josh Bernoff of Forrester, “Strategies For Interactive Marketing In A Recession”. Josh argues through his research and insight that interactive marketing and social media applications will see a boon because of this potential bust. Why? He groups it this way for social media apps:
Well-designed social applications are effective
They’re cheap
They motivate consumers in the middle of the funnel
These line up well with the bullet points I often relate to prospects, clients and colleagues when discussing the benefit of social media. Much has been discussed around this and certainly go check some of those out. What I wanted to talk about is, if this is true (and again, I believe it is), where will this leave PR?
I realize that we’ve talked about the “us vs. them” mentality, but it is again a critical juncture for folks in the PR business to secure the hatches for this tidal shift that will be brought on due to a potential recession. In that post from Jeremy Pepper there is a comment from Phil Gomes that has resonated with me, in short this statement:
“My message (underscoring your thoughts in the post): So-called “social media experts” (no such thing, IMHO) should start caring more about elevating their organization and their profession.”
If you as a PR individual have not heeded the advice being spread by folks for the past two years now is the time when you will begin to pay the price. If you as a PR agency have not remodeled yourself in order to be able to not only think in a social media manner but actually develop social media applications the time is upon you and your employees. Yes, there is still a bit of time left to get yourself some education by reading, talking and participating. But to be honest I think this is the moment we see the people who have prepared for this moment begin to rise to the top.
In fact, because it’s just fun and ultimately a silly practice, I predict that in the next 90 days:
- Some of the mid-size agencies gobble up some social media expertise and interactive services functionality
- The amount of “Social Media” job descriptions will double
- We will see some major shifting of roles and some culling of the herd within PR agencies and internal PR departments to address the recession and the need to get better results on the cheap (this is a no-brainer)
- The market will see it’s first “Chief Social Media Officer” or something of the sort (has this already happened?)
/kff
February 7th, 2008 at 10:14 am
kyle - excellent post. for an in-depth look at why some agencies will start to “gobble up some social media expertise and interactive services functionality” i’d humbly point your readers to a post I did on this a few weeks ago.
Ed
February 7th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Bold predictions, my friend. I agree with them in many ways. There’s a definite change that has occurred. Everyone wants to be a part of the social media mix now. It’s time for the vast majority to adopt. Next year, you will be too late.
February 7th, 2008 at 12:17 pm
It’s good to be a part of the group in that case ;)
/kff
February 8th, 2008 at 11:21 am
Ed, my apologies, I just saw that your comment was caught in the Akismet spam filter?? I’m very glad you pointed folks to your post and I actually updated the post with it as well.
Thanks,
/kff
February 13th, 2008 at 8:33 pm
It is one thing to really believe in a product and another to be actually be too preachy about it. And it is where Social Media and PR diverge as I see it. Or maybe I just can’t get a good grasp on why there are genuine conversations and one-sided, attention-hogging rants.
I’m still learning.
Best.
alain
February 15th, 2008 at 7:01 am
[…] third point of discussion was around my post on February 7th: “One Man’s Recession is Another Man’s Profit”. In the post I made some off-the-cuff predictions, some a bit tongue in cheek, but most of them I […]
February 16th, 2008 at 9:11 am
Alain, I’m not sure that PR has as its mantra to preach about products…well, at least good PR. PR has always been a way to communicate a message, sometime about a product, but if it is to be effective it is actually about a benefit of that product. Traditional PR (although not the original PR methods) used a third party to communicate to the community; media, analysts, experts, etc.
Social media allows you to eliminate the third party and engage directly with your community AND have them interact back. Good PR people understand the power of this conversation and how to allow it to happen…the problem actually boils down to the fact that the ranks of ‘good’ PR folks is scarce today.
/kff