I’m a firm believer in analogies, and this particularly pungent one may explain why many Social Media campaigns are doomed to failure.
To experience the full fragrance of this lesson, you need to know a little about how to make compost without making a stink. (I don’t apologize for the comparison, as many consider modern reputation management to be little more than “fertilizer” anyway.)
Whether you call it “New Media” or “Social Media”, there are many parallels to compost.
- Compost itself has little intrinsic value, but it makes plants grow faster
- Compost – like Social Media – does happen on its own, but not fast enough to be of use
- Compost – while made of natural ingredients – is not meant to be consumed directly
- Compost earns blue ribbons based on what it grows and how it grows it
Making a Pile
While “compost happens”, it doesn’t happen fast enough for the savvy gardener. Instead, there are several rules of thumb governing the types of leaves and organic debris one includes in the pile. The amount of water you add to the mix determines its temperature, and can accelerate or decelerate the fermentation. The pile must be periodically turned and churned to ensure uniform conversion – a commitment to periodically get your hands dirty in a personal way.
If you’re not careful, you end up with too much nitrate generation – or maybe too little. Cooking your compost too quickly also prevents the formation of many useful nutrients that replenish the soil. And if you do everything improperly, you end up with a big smelly pile that no one wants to claim or go near.
Making Social Media
While “social media” can happen on its own, it benefits from expert help. Each social media practitioner brings a different prescription for the right mix of ingredients. Along the way, you have to closely monitor the conditions, and know when to add water, when to goose the process, and when to back off. You also need to stay involved and engaged with the project, realizing this is a process – requiring a commitment to periodically get your hands dirty in a personal way.
If you’re not careful, you destroy the very organic support you were trying to cultivate. And there’s no real value in making compost, unless you intend to use it to feed and supplement existing public relations and reputation management efforts. If you have an expectation of overnight results, you aren’t growing anything of value. And if you’re caught cheating, you end up with a smelly pile that soils your name and encourages others to distance themselves from you.
The Bottom Line
New Media tactics and tools are far from a panacea. If you’re not willing or able to use them properly, don’t get involved. It’s hard work and requires attention – and it can enhance everything else you do. Or it can stink up the joint.
Before you hire someone to help you with a Social Media campaign, check under their fingernails. You’d be surprised how many have never soiled their hands, and don’t really know any more than you do.
Remember that it’s about the produce. You’re not buying a bucket of rich, earthy loam. You’re buying the vegetables.
And there are always those who feel like they can get better results by trucking in a load of something else and spreading it around.
(Ike Pigott regularly writes at Occam’s RazR.)
Genius. absolute genius.
Ike, I’m chuckling over here. Once again, your writing skills make me want to crawl under the desk. I must reach this level of strong, fabulous, creative writing!
With regards to the actual post, I am glad you reminded people to check under an agency’s fingernails. I recently received a marketing piece from a local agency that touted how they are experts in this new media and gave definitions, bullets that tease you into wanting more information so that you call them, etc. Here’s the funny part: I hired and fired this agency a year ago because while they started out strong with my project, they quickly became focused on the bigger fish within my company versus paying attention to the business unit that was actually the client. I’m pretty sure their hands never get dirty.
Discrimination against those of us who chew our nails!
Ike,
Very well done. With your permission I will use the analogy when I talk to people about this subject.
omg! I *so* needed to read this today…..thanks 🙂
the frustrating thing is, if you *are* one of those people who’s got loads of dirt under her fingernails, there’s always someone who says that you can’t possibly know what you’re doing because you never learned how to build the *correct* kind of composting box. But, as you note, you can be a professional composter and still have no idea how it gets made.
@ the Susans – thank you for reading!
@ Lauren – you’re still free to chew your nails, as long as you accept the consequences.
@ Mario – I’d be honored if you helped spread the…. metaphor.
@ Tish – The “professional composters” who don’t know how to make things grow are “professional imposters.” Not only do they not have any dirt under their nails, that shiny new *correct* composting box they’ve got on display has never been dirty either!
Spot on – well put indeed!
*applauding*
Incredibel! The analogy is spot on!
Love your post!! Finally someone got it right!!! Would you mind if I put a blogroll link back to your post? 🙂
Social Media is organic! I think there is a level which we hope to understand which makes some people who have used it professionally have lessons which have been taught by trying to tend to the garden! Sometimes a few vegetables must take the fall for a good program to work well!
haha, great site, “professional composters are proefssional imposters”