The Gist of Social Media or "Don’t Make a Mountain out of a Molehill"

by Aaron Whitaker
MZD Senior Copywriter


The front porch, the fence, the coffee shop, the local bar, the water cooler.

These are all places where we go to converse with other people. To share stories, to tell jokes, to talk business, to make friends.

Twitter, Facebook, Friendfeed, blogs, Digg, Linkedin.

These are all places where we go to converse with other people. To share stories, to tell jokes, to talk business, to make friends. These places are the online coffee shop, the online water cooler, the online bar. This is what social media is.

This is social media.

Social media gives you a great opportunity to get out there online and talk with (not talk to) thousands of people as a friend and fellow human being first and as a business, product and/or brand second.

People trust those they know. Those they like.

Tell jokes, reply to questions, share something funny that happened on the way to work; the more you converse, the more the people will get to know you and hopefully like you as a friend and as their future sheriff.

The other side of the coin.

People will talk bad about you, false accusations will be written about you. People will praise you. They’ll spread the love, they’ll spread the hate. People will talk about your competition. The key is to know about it as it happens and respond accordingly. The key is to listen. This is social monitoring.

Listen first, talk second.

Social monitoring is probably the most important part of any social marketing effort. The idea is to listen to what is being said about you and your competition and be able to take action. Whether it is a comment on a blog, a Twitter post, a remark on Facebook, a video, or a picture; you need to have the right listening tools to respond in an efficient and timely manner.

Get out there and talk.

That’s the gist of social media and social monitoring. It’s a big, complex world that changing every day, but the core, fundamental idea of it all is talking, conversing and listening. So get out there and talk with your fellow human as they get to know you, your company and/or your brand better.