Social Media Experterie…

Yeah, I know that isn't a word. :)

I have been working on my Capstone proposal for the culmination of my Master's degree lately. It is do super soon... and I am just about to wrap up the proposal process. (Now I just have to cut 1000 words... yeah, I'm wordy, we know that right?)

I came across this article on Twitter. I was initially attracted to it because I am a HUGE Sarah Evans fan (I started following her years ago and was very impressed by her ideas). But the other really interesting thing about this article was that I was writing about this very topic.

Too many people calling themselves Social Media _____ (insert platitude here) - guru? expert? ideologue? evangelist?

Fact of the matter is... we are all still trying to figure out the best ways to use social media and inbound marketing. You can have it all figured out and then Myspace becomes "dorky" and Facebook is the new hot thing. Social media and inbound marketing is fluid and ever changing. None of us can really call ourselves experts yet... especially people who were tapped to be the social media point person BECAUSE they have a Facebook profile. Now, nothing against those people (because I was one of them and innovated SM for my organization because I was the only one familiar with it) but it take more than that to understand SM and how to use it.

In completing my Masters in PR & Marketing, one thing that surprised me was job definitions of PR people... one book said 50% of our job is research. There is an impression that you aren't working if you aren't typing press releases or making phone calls, the reality is that we must spend time on the internet and on these tools to innovate.

Here is the article that I was talking about - Is your social media expert really an expert?

I love their bullets... what do you think? My SM professor liked #24 particularly...