Chip Griffin on Throwing Out The Social Media Rulebook

I initially dismissed Chip Griffin's luke-warm conservative thinking as tripe -- calling him an 'idiot' in a del.iou.us link published here -- and rereading it just confirms my feelings. It one of those wrong-headed posts that is based on a shadowy strawman that has hypothetically made a bunch of assertions Chip endeavors to knock down. But who actually made the assertions? No one. So Chip instead demonizes an imaginary 'rulebook' that some evil cabal of leftist edglings have written, another The Protocols of the Elders of Zion hoax.

But it's at core false, and the various points are silly:

[from Throwing Out the Social Media Rulebook - Media Bullseye by Chip Griffin]

Here, then, are a few of the rules that just make no sense.

1. It Isn’t a Blog Without RSS. Go ask someone outside of the tight social media circle you play in and ask them if they use an RSS reader. If you don’t get a blank stare or a quizzical look, count it as a victory even when they say “no.” The fact of the matter is that RSS belongs to the uber-geek set. Yes, some tools are making this easier, but you would be surprised to learn that even some social media mavens (don’t force me to name names, you know who you are) still use things like Firefox bookmarks to read blogs.

As with most of these 'rules', no one credible is arguing them in our 'tight social media circle'. But a blog can be a conversational community of involvement, and the more of the possible supports that you build into a blog, the more likely it is that people will converse.

Chip is missing principles and focusing on details, trying to explode them into something important. The real issue is a bias toward open dialogue: the more you support that, the more that details like RSS and comments make sense.

2. It Isn’t a Blog Without Comments. Hogwash. Do comments often make blog posts better? Absolutely. Can you learn things from reading them that you might not have learned from the original post? Sure. Do comments help build a relationship between reader and author? Of course. But you can have a great blog without comments. Marc Andreesen of Netscape fame pens a fantastic example, but the zealots would dismiss it as inauthentic. And note how this idea clashes with the previous rule the zealots profess about RSS – when you read a blog via RSS you don’t even see the comments.

See comment above. And some blog solutions provide RSS for comments, Chip. And, yes, comments make things better.

3. The Press Release is Dead. Sorry, Tom Foremski and friends, but the press release is here to stay. That’s not to say you should be emailing bloggers with press releases, but traditional media still do use them, when delivered appropriately and targeted correctly. Like most communications tools, the press release will continue to evolve, but it’s not time to drop it from the arsenal.

As I have said at least two dozen times since the social media press release idea has come along, press releases may have their place in the new world. But a lot of the bilge in press releases -- the third party disembodied voice, the phony quotes that the CEO never really said, the overblown hyperbole dripping with superlatives -- is about as tantalizing as a strong laxative.

Also, the current legal requirements that various wire services must be used for various sorts of announcements could be changed, if we dreamed up a web-based alternative that met our societal needs. Remember -- the law is in place to serve us, not to hold us hostage.

4. The Social Media Release is King. I know Todd Defren will think “heresy!” when he reads these words, but the social media release ain’t nothing but a press release served up in chunks rather than in story fashion. As someone who consumes such releases for use on some of the media sites I publish, I actually like the story ones better. Either way, the SMR is at best evolution, not revolution.

Personally, I am opposed to the social media press release. I think we should simply create some bottom-up protocols -- a ping service and an identity confirmation mechanism -- so that we could simply post announcements anywhere, instead of the odd-ball telegraph era approach that is today's convention.

5. It’s All About Conversation Not Messages. The word “conversation” has a very nice ring to it. It sounds egalitarian and idealistic, especially when applied to corporate marketing behavior. But ultimately social media campaigns are – and should be – about the message. Companies don’t control the message today any more than they did in the past. But to suggest that corporations or non-profits or political campaigns should be prepared to start a conversation and not try to guide it in such a way as to deliver a specific message is both naive and wrong.

This is where Chip goes right off the tracks, and proves he doesn't know what he is talking about.

People are engaged in conversations already. They don't need some corporation to start one for them, thank you very much. This is our Web, our World. If some suit from a corporation wants to join our conversation, come on, jump in. But you can't join by stridently extolling the virtues of your products and being unwilling to hear some negative feedback.

We don't need them: they need us.

Companies are free to do what ever they like on the Web. It's open for all manner of uses. But broadcasting messages that don't gibe with what people think just won't work anymore.

6. The Customer Controls the Relationship. No, I’m not a Cluetrain disciple. That may put me in a fraternity of one among my social media evangelist colleagues, but I call’em like I see’em. The Cluetrain Manifesto offers many good ideas and some provocative thinking but the notion that customers are in charge is off base. Customers have always had a significant impact on companies and they will continue to do so. They provide the ideas to enhance products and the inspiration to create new ones. Customers vote with their wallets to determine winners and losers in the marketplace. But companies still play a huge role in the process and all of us as communicators must understand that.

Yes, you are not a Cluetrain disciple. You have not grasped that power has shifted, the balance has swung.

7. Authenticity and Transparency are Immutable Truths. Wrong-o! Where’s my buzzer? There’s a big difference between being fraudulent and getting help behind the scenes. Companies need to build a trust relationship with their audience (and yes, I still use that word) and this likely requires some disclosure and a sense of realism. But there’s no reason why a CEO who can’t write well shouldn’t rely on a ghostwriter. It happens every day with speeches, and a blog should be no different. It’s the message that’s important and the messenger must agree with it, but it need not be a question of who taps the keyboard. Similarly, a company should not feel compelled to reveal the inner workings of its relationship with an outside agency in building content and developing strategy.

If you think of people as 'customers' that are an 'audience' for your message, then you are not considering them people, and you are not aware that they would like to interact with other people, not a monolithic corporation. When companies drop their guard, and allow individuals to become involved with people outside the company on one:one and many:many basis, change happens.

However, old school dinosaurs -- those that advise their client companies that this social media junk is just another channel to push messages to the audience -- certainly don't want this to happen. If the PR folks can't craft messages and send out press releases, what are they going to do for a job?

The ghostwriter issue is just another example of the inauthenticity of our world, and why people don't really think much of corporate CEOs or politicians. Should Lincoln have used a ghostwriter for the Gettysburg Address? Do you think Martin Luther King, Churchill or Gandhi used speechwriters?

8. Audience is a Word of the Past. Somewhere between 1 and 10 percent of people who read blogs comment. It’s not a true conversation if more than 90% of the people just listen. What you have, friends, is an audience still. That’s not to say that new media isn’t more conversational than old media, but just as a small percentage of folks call radio talk shows or write letters to the editor, the same few comment on blogs. That means there’s still a vast audience to communicate to in a more traditional way.

Wait a second. What about the person writing the post? Like me, right now? I write all my posts, and so do the overwhelming majority of other bloggers. We are connecting to each other, commenting on others thoughts, like I am doing now regarding your sad thoughts in your post, Chip.

Most successful blogs have more comments that posts: isn't that a more important metric than the percentage or people commenting? I defined the Conversational Index to measure that (comments+trackbacks/posts). And everyone does not have to comment everywhere for this to be a world of conversation.

William Gibson said, "The future is here already. It's just unevenly distributed." For me, and a small world of others, the audience is a word of the past. Alas, for you, that is the future, or never.

Consider the cocktail party as a metaphor. At a cocktail party some people speak more than others, and at different times people are involved in different topics and their level of involvement changes. People wander around, new people come, some people go. It doesn't have to be completely democratic to be a cocktail party. But one guy talking all the time and everybody else listening isn't a party, it's media hell.

9. Lack of Comments Means Lack of Influence. Many social media evangelists argue for the use of comments as a proxy for influence. Some would combine it with links and other more traditional measures, while others focus more heavily on comments. In fact, comments can be a measure of influence, but not across all types of social media or all content verticals (industries). For instance, most would agree that Rafat Ali’s PaidContent blog is influential, yet as of this writing only one of the 10 posts on its home page has comments (and even it only has 3 total).

Rafat Ali and some other blogs have become de facto media outlets, rather than the normal, social scale blogs. However, the great fat middle of the long tail -- leaving aside the top few hundred blogs, and out to the 10,000 mark -- have become influential in smaller, human scale niches, where you see lots of comments. Smart PR folks realize this, and tailor their work to take advantage of it. Dumb PR people don't, and only go for the few giant bloggers. Or convince their corporate clients that it's ok if their corporate blogs don't have comments: "After all, the audience is still getting your message, JR! That's what matters!"

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Anyway, I had resisted writing this piece initially, since it seems like rewarmed leftovers. Didn't we have this conversation last year, and the year before, and the year before that?

I know that a number of others (Brian Solis, and Phil Gomes, for example) have written detailed responses to Chip's screed: I haven't detailed my thoughts about their commentary, but I have found it interesting. A number of other dinosaurs have rallied to Chip's side, suggesting he is fighting the good fight against the zealots who wrote the rulebook. (Er, what rulebook?)

Maybe as we move ahead in the social revolution, as the wave front spreads out and the ripples bump against more and more of the late adopters, the majoritarians who always resist any innovation as destablilzing, scary, and a possible tool of the devil, these arguments will come up again and again.

Most of the early adopters are so over this they will yawn as they read it.

But the entrenched enemies of the future (as Virginia Postrel styles them) will fight this social shift: the centroids who believe the old ways are the best ways, that innovation leading to more power in the hands of the individual is dangerous, and that companies should hold onto whatever advantage that money and power can provide them, even if that is bad for people and society, even if it can be shown to be selfish and wrong.

I don't hear these folks asking what is good for the average person, or how can we use these tools to make the world a better place to live and work. Instead, they dream up a phony rulebook that some group of conspirators are trying to push onto poor, little old multinational corporations, in order to screw them. Oh sure, that's what we are doing. We are trying to get companies to disadvantage themselves through the adoption of open dialogue. Yes, that's our dream. I confess.

So, no: I won't take back the 'idiot' comment. I meant it then and I mean it now.

Comments

[David Jones]

There's no shortage of PR/media/marketing folks out there in the bloggyverse who are trying to define the social media world so that those who like things just-so and in-control can wrap themselves in a nice set of rules and believe that there is some sort of order.

There's as much order in social media as in a kindergarten class and nobody's got rich running a daycare centre.

Is it the desire to turn a buck off this space that leads people to create "rules" in the first place? Convince people it's safe and they'll be all over it and money will follow. If we convince each other that we get it and we're doing it right, then we can convince our clients to pay us to tell them all of these secret rules that exist.

There is far too much focus on "getting it" and "doing it right" and not enough emphasis on embracing "authentic, open dialogue" and "empowered individuals."

If you start with believing in those concepts then you'll do everything you need to do to create online environments where you, your rep, your company, your products and so on will thrive.

(Then again, perhaps none of these posts would have been written if Seth Godin would have just turned his comments back on!)

[Dan Keldsen]

Whew - Just as I've started to write shorter posts, it's pleasant to see you run amok on the commentary! ;)

Quick comments:
Agree - there is no rulebook, or if there is, it's being constantly re-written. Even if there is, half the fun is in breaking the rules and creating new rules. Personally I prefer guidelines.

The transparency/conversation aspect - the saddest part of shutting off comments/trackbacks on a blog is not that it kills conversations, it just forces them to take place elsewhere, and possibly in places you (as a company or person at a company) will now have to go out of your way to find, and have a chance of at least passively being a fly on the wall. Why not have that conversation somewhere easier to participate in (or fine, just listen in on)? Huge missed opportunity.

And based on this post, boy am I glad I didn't mangle anything further on my blog and the PR earlier this week! Whew, feel like I dodged a bullet... ;) (still feeling like an idiot nonetheless)

[Jess]

I'm going to tack this onto my cube wall.

"a lot of the bilge in press releases -- the third party disembodied voice, the phony quotes that the CEO never really said, the overblown hyperbole dripping with superlatives -- is about as tantalizing as a strong laxative."

[Ike]

Devil's Advocate here, Stowe.

I agree that you can't put the genie back into the bottle, and as more people dip their toes into the free waters of the Social Web, their expectations change. They want more control, and resist constraint - in their surfing and their communications.

You cite Gibson: "The future is here, but unevenly distributed." Isn't this making a fundamental assumption that *everyone* will want and crave the freedom you and your circle of early adopters enjoy? I see a backlash trend coming from users (tech and nontech) who are tired of complex arrangements and options. They just want things that work, and don't want to have to think about it.

Some feel that most blog readers don't comment because they already agree, or already sense that their comment won't matter. Some might be afraid of leaving a digital trail of their identity or email for some reason. But there are many in our society that are a step beyond 'not caring.' They will never have an interest in engaging in conversations with organizations, corporate or otherwise.

Yes, the ice is cracking and the cracking is accelerating. But is it so inevitable that it will completely shatter into the lake? Or might we see large sections of ice, still anchored to the shore, populated by those who aren't uncomfortable with the way things have been?

I don't represent anyone - I'm just asking the question.

[Geoff Livingston]

I thought the post was full of you know what, too. And I made that clear to Chip as well. But in the end folks that can't roll with social media principles and they try to pull this stuff out here, will be rolling themselves into the soup line.

[Alice]

Wow, great post. You know something is powerful when the old guard is scared witless about it.

[Paul]

I agree with many of the things in your post, but the idea that anyone who thinks in terms of "audiences" and "messages" doesn't get it is just plain silly. There's absolutely nothing inherent in the idea of audiences and messages that is out-of-step with the things that are good about social media -- specifically, the ability to connect with people and engage in authentic, open, honest conversations.

Your cocktail party metaphor actually describes what I'm talking about. Suppose I'm at a cocktail party and someone shows up who's an expert on a topic that I'd like to know more about. What happens when he starts explaining something about that topic?...I become the audience. Am I in "media hell?" Of course not! The relationship isn't equal, but we're both getting something valuable out of it. Now hopefully at some point he'll have provided enough information that I can ask probing questions, disagree with his viewpoint, provide my opinion, etc. At that point, we've shifted from an audience/messenger relationship to a conversation.

This is analogous to how the ideas of messaging and audiences provide value in commercial relationships. I've worked for companies in the past where I was involved in the purchase of software products. When a vendor came to us with a new product, I WANTED them to pitch to me because hearing how they describe their unique value proposition was valuable to me. Now, at some point I'd become educated enough that we'd engage in a conversation and if their description didn't hold up once I'd become more educated (or if they didn't treat me with honesty, openness and respect during the decision process), they were toast.

My point is that thinking in terms of audience, message and customer is in no way opposed to engaging in authentic conversations ...they actually enhance each other and there's a time and a place for each.

[Richard D. Chennault]

They said that the telegraph would change society in much the same way the futurist who proclaim Web 2.0/Social Media will change society.

I wonder how impacting Web 2.0/Social Media is to the itinerant farm worker who can scarcely afford to put food on the family table?

I believe social media as a further adjunct to social change but not the revolutionary change agent that is often ascribed to it.