This post is slightly different from yesterday's blog. Yesterday, I talked about a message I received on Yelp in response to some feedback that I left. I pointed out that it was a very positive experience and the business owner genuinely appreciated the feedback and wanted me to come back and try their business again.Today I want to talk about our 24 second attention span/news-cycle and the advent of mean online commenting, either anonymously or through features like Facebook Connect.Have you read any controversial news article online lately? Ever make it down to the comments? I often wish I didn't. For me, it is often an article about a Jewish topic or issue or relating to Israel. The virulent hatred just spews!! It's amazing because I am pretty sure none of those people could say any of that nasty business to a person's face. What's more is that it is rarely constructive or helpful. More often than not, it is close-minded and hurtful comments that, if said aloud in a public place, would shock the living daylights out of you.We pride ourselves on being tolerant and kind to our neighbors... except online. Clearly, this is not a unique phenomenon. We have armchair quarterbacks and backseat drivers... even sofa bobsledders... (that's a reference to my father's favorite episode of Dharma and Greg where the men are watching the Winter Olympics and decide that bobsledding is super easy, even they can do it. So they fly somewhere like Tahoe where there is snow on the ground and attempt to bobsled with a canoe and football helmets... needless to say, it doesn't work out so well.) It is always so easy to criticize someone from behind a keyboard and monitor. You know they can't reach out and hit you but you also feel the bravado of not being faced with any of their realities.The fact of the matter is this - Online commenting is losing it's power because we abuse it. Rather than contributing to the conversation, more often than not, we just want to be a part of it... no matter whether that is positive or negative. People vie for the 'bragging rights' to comment "FIRST" on articles. We trash women for being too skinny, too fat, too ugly, too pretty... Rather than posting constructive comments, we call people nasty names that would have garnered soap in our mouths. And we sit back and judge and make assumptions based on the few facts available to us.The social media culture we live in has only enhanced this. We have shortening attention spans and our news-cycle is 24 seconds rather than the older 24 hour cycle of my youth or the 7 - 14 day cycle of my grandparent's youth. We sit in front of the TV with an iPhone and Macbook while the news is reported and scrolls on the bottom of the screen.And we aren't going to change this culture.This is why we, as marketers, have to be as present as possible in every medium. We have to have our ears to the ground listening to every established service and our minds in the clouds imagining what could be next. In a recent Science of Timing webinar from the great company, HubSpot, we talked about how often and when you should post to Facebook and Twitter. One key rule that I will share here is: you will be forgiven for more on Twitter than Facebook. Post each article at least three times on twitter but only once on Facebook. Otherwise, your followers may block you from their FB news feed but miss you in the noise of Twitter.So we can't change the way people interact online but with the wealth of information out there, we can choose not to look at comments... which is the way I think our society is moving. Some people find such joy in the trolling or arguing but most people ignore it. However, as a marketer, it is important to pay attention to what people are saying in comments and on social media so you can respond appropriately to the genuine comments.Thus completes my series. Hope it was helpful!
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