Social Media Marketing – Is leveraging your life a good idea?
As I spend more time on the web one thing permeates all my experience; social media, I would say that like many I am now almost dependant on networking sites like: Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn and media sharing services like YouTube, Flikr and Digg.
I embrace this technology because it allows me a flexibility to live my life, do my job and keep in touch with my family and friends from any location; I say that I dependant on these sites not because I couldn’t live without them but because the time they save me day to day in achieving my goals is something I cannot match in any other way.
However I cannot help but feel that in recent years this world has begun to develop a serious problem – affiliate marketing – It started with successful bloggers leveraging their social media profile to generate revenue, either from product reviews or endorsements; great I hear you say; why not make some money out of something you are passionate about and do well?
I don’t argue with this, there are many fantastic examples of people who make a living in social media in this manner, what I have a problem with is how this has morphed into wealth creation systems using social media to post pay per click affiliate links and advertising banners. This has been driving in a larger part by twitter and so-called link spamming but across social media people are using it combined with tools such as Google AdSense to drive consumers to pushy sales sites for the promise of thousands in ‘easy income’; there are even people out there who will create ‘free’ social media profile packages so people can do this more easily…
Now I know the web is a free world and people can do what they want, and maybe my beliefs in communication and sharing information are a bit high and mighty, but my problem isn’t really what people do…if you want to do this great, that’s your choice (although it probably won’t generate the wealth you expect) my contention is, is it a good idea to turn your web identity into a marketing tool essentially for other people?
As an entrepreneur and an academic I have come to realise that the creation of identity in all its forms is a wonderful thing; seeing people develop and change is amazing and the ways in which social media can support that are endlessly wonderful, only last week I talked to a student who had changed her life running a business in second life – something she had done to rebuild her confidence.
However more and more I am seeing people build a presence based on an idea that it will help them get rich and change their life, here’s a lesson social media is not a magic pill and it’s not easy and if you want to make money out of it, then it’s going to be a job that you need to work at and the centre of that job needs to be an authentic message that people want to hear…something you can never generate if you are only in it for the money – quite simply people won’t believe the identify you are creating and then your life in social media may as well be over.
So next time you are thinking of using social media as a way of generating money just ask yourself why? If the answer is because it’s something you do, love and want to make a bit of extra cash…around an authentic message, great…if not think twice!
Great post Matt.
It’s so true unfortunately. I think when it comes to social media and people making money from it, I’m concerned by 3 things.
1. Many of the people who promote themselves as being social media gurus have little or no experience of creating a success business through the use of social media marketing.
2. Why do people need to make money from social media anyway? It’s supposed to be a conversation not a sales pitch. When have you ever spoken to someone and they were making money out of what they were saying to you?
3. The people who actually make money from social media are the people who don’t try. They’re the ones who are just passionate about what they do and eventually someone rocks along and says “do you know what I’ll pay you $x for a bit of advertising space.” The people who chase money online very rarely make anything from it.