Beware the lone (social media) gunman

Inspired yet again by something Joe Jaffe said (ain’t podcasts fun?), here’s my thought for the day on social media and agencies:

Watch out for ad, PR, and marketing agencies who grab one senior guy with some practical social media experience, declare him their expert, and never bother to build the bench depth behind him.

In theory it’s nice and easy. Grab a “rock star” who has a kick ass blog and a few tens of thousands of Twitter followers, give him a fancy title, and trot him out as a proof point in front of clients to show “hey look! we get it!” The flaw in that concept is twofold, one tactical and one more strategic.

On the tactical side, that one senior guy can’t know everything about social media, and even if maybe he knows a metric ton-load, someone has still got to do the work. If there’s no depth of social media-savvy talent on the bench behind him, then what? Who’s going to drive the engagements, dig deep into Facebook, and show some love to the crazy-yet-awesome fans of your brand? It’s not him, so make sure you understand how strong the bench is first.

On the strategic side, the “lone gunman” approach should be flashing big red warning signs to any client committed to social media. First, it indicates that the agency isn’t all the serious about social and will likely apply it only skin deep to your campaigns and strategy, bolted on at the end like some third-rate aftermarket fender.

Second, it signals that your agency is willing to play “check off the capabilities” box with you, without truly developing the practice and skills needed to make your campaigns shine in social media. If they’re willing to trot out this old tactic, what else are they skimping on?

So be suitably wary when you see that “Chief Social Officer” tagging along on the next campaign pitch. You may just be looking at the entire social media team.

Yet again, social media is not about any tool or platform

It’s an argument that never seems to die, and only gains strength when the next hot platform or tool becomes the darling of the social media world. So let’s shoot it down again:

Social media is not about Twitter. It’s bigger than Facebook. There’s more to it than blogging, YouTube, LinkedIn, or [insert platform du jour here].

Mitch Joel and Joe Jaffe brought this one up during the most recent Jaffe Juice podcast, in response to the “do you tweet?” challenge to traditional ad agencies from the CMO of JetBlue, Marty St. George:

The tweet itself isn’t really the issue – it was rather innocuous and kind of funny, when you get down to it. Especially when you look imagine the key biz dev guys at some of the big shops scrambling their team to “follow him! follow him! For the love of God, at least throw the man an @!”

But Joe and Mitch used the tweet to bring up a larger, and valid point: whether an agency is on, and monitoring, Twitter isn’t really a valid litmus test for their digital savvy. Yes, in this day and age it’s probably dumb of them not to, but it shouldn’t be a make or break test. Why?

Because as I said above, social media isn’t about one platform or tool. It’s about developing a certain mindset and understanding about how the way brands interact with their customers (and critics) has fundamentally changed. How people want to be part of a brand, to define, to make it their own, and not just be talked at. like in the golden years of the traditional agency.

Twitter is only four years old, about the same length of time that Facebook has been open to the world beyond college students. YouTube is all of five years old. Five. They may die any day now for all we know. Twitter could pull a Friendfeed, get bought up, cashed out, and ignored into oblivion despite the howling protests of its passionate users. A year from now something currently seeking seed funding could be doing to Facebook what it did to MySpace (and Friendster).

The tools will change, the platforms will evolve. No “are you using this tool or that one” litmus test should hold any real weight when determining the social media intelligence of your agencies. It’s about the mindset and the fundamental understanding of the new ways of doing business – that’s what you should look for in your agencies, those attributes that will survive the inevitable platform transitions that will make us all look back fondly at our cute Twitter addictions.

Where Ivar’s thumbed a barnacle at transparency, and it worked

“He has been called the greatest self-promoter in the history of Seattle.” So said the Seattle Times this past September about Ivar Haglund, the founder of the Ivar’s seafood restaurant chain. The article goes on to describe the “discovery” of a barnacle encrusted billboard in the waters of Puget Sound out in front of downtown Seattle, supposedly put there in the 1950′s by a very forward looking Mr. Haglund.

He apparently foresaw the coming of a future of cross-Sound underwater ferries and a wonderful opportunity to promote his 75 cent cups of chowder. A local historian even chimed in, citing documents discovered in the company’s archives which supported the authenticity and hinted their might be more submerged billboards yet to be found.

A fantastic story, one which perfectly supported the Ivar brand, and garnered reams of local press coverage – and a 5-10% uptick in customer volume in the middle of a major recession.

Of course, it was all a hoax. A masterful joke played on the public, and the local media, by the crew at Ivar’s, the aforementioned local historian, and a local ad agency named Heckler Associates.

In this age of authenticity and transparency, was Ivar’s wrong in running with this oddball marketing campaign? After all, this wasn’t just some creative misdirection, or a hidden sponsor of some viral video. The company flat out lied, and even pulled in a credible historian to lie for them.

Shouldn’t they suffer some blowback or tarnish to their otherwise feel good reputation?

In this case, I’d have to say no. In an odd way, this blatant lie in support of a marketing campaign adds more to the Ivar’s brand – that of blatant, over-the-top, and creative ways to push some tasty clam chowder – than any wholly transparent social media or marketing effort I can think of.

The lie, in effect, makes them more authentic. Genius in its own way.

Photo via the linked Seattle Times article.