Can Brands be social?

My friend Jeremiah has been on a tear with valuable content lately.  He's really coming of age now that he's this big mucky muck over at Forrester Research. He's been asking a lot of people a lot of things about brands and communities marketing and social networks.

He's provided a lot of really interesting insights. I'm sorry he has not asked me, but I'll probably spend some time telling him tonight when we have dinner together--whether he asks me or not.

I think his perspective is moving away from some of the fundamentals that make social media different and superior to traditional branding campaigns and marketing.  When he asks such questions as "who owns a community" or should brands Twitter, he's revealing that he may be getting a bit too snug with clients.  When you begin seeing the world through the perspective those clients have, there's a danger you'll lose you greatest value, the value of turning that perspective inside out.

The essence of social media is that it is humans.  Humans connect to humans and they form communities. They own their communities, brands don't. The perspective of traditional marketing is to take a message and find delivery channels to inseminate into people's foreheads. This is not social. Social is for a marketing executive to start a blog and ask people why they hate his marketing efforts--then listen--really listen to what people say the way Dell has done and a few others are trying to do.

Brands don't Twitter.  People Twitter.  And if I follow someone on Twitter and it turns out I like and trust that person, then I may feel better about the brands he represents. Can brands be social? Of course not. Brands are inanimate intangible things. They are contrivances intended to make you feel some sort of emotion about a company or it's icons. That is not a social thing.

Whether his clients like those messages or not, they are the truth and to try to chip away at the truth is an unfortunate exercise even when it is well intentioned.

At least that's the sort of stuff I will tell me good friend Jeremiah at dinner tonight. It should make for an interesting conversation.

Comments

[Jeremiah Owyang]

If you look carefully, I just asked questions, and didn't state my own opinion. Same thing for the post on Sunday about "join vs build".

Sometimes, I'm using these tools not to state my opinion, but to listen in and hear from others.

There are very specific reason why I've been asking these questions.

Will tell you more about this later tonight.

[Steve Ames]

Super clarity Shel, thank you!

[Aaron Strout]

Shel - I love your post and this is a great discussion. However, I'll argue two points with you.

1) People like you, Doc, Jeremiah and Scoble are all brands, whether you care to admit that or not. And you are people. I happen to like all of your brands and like the fact that you all use social media.

2) While I agree, not all brands can or should use social media (at least not outwardly), there are a number of companies like VMWare (part of EMC), Brewtopia, Threadless where community and social media are part of their brand.

I look forward to reading your and others comments on this important discussion.

Best,

Aaron

[shel israel]

Jeremiah,

I have read you very carefully and you should not accuse me of posting without doing so. You are leading a conversation that is working a problem from the wrong perspective. You are helping people try to figure out how to game the conversation by having inanimate objects join in. It's no better than a character blog.

Aaron, I would argue that all of us ave personal brands and blogging increases it. But I would argue that Robert Scoble is considerable more human and listen a lot better than a Coke Bottle, or a Nike Swoosh.

[Jeremiah Owyang]

My job as a researcher is to get to the truth of the matter, and I'm often finding I'm asking questions of the community to get answers.

I'm not quite sure how you equate leading a conversation about topics that are top of mind for many folks who are trying to figure this out to 'how to game the conversation by having inanimate objects join in'.

That's a pretty big stretch, so I look forward to your explanation tonight.

[Aaron Strout]

Shel - I'm laughing about the "conversation with a Coke bottle" comment. The visual is wonderful!

I would agree with you that Scoble is much more approachable than many other brands. But I think there are also corporate brands that have made themselves much more approachable by creating communities and attempting to start conversations via social media. Many do it poorly but they are trying.

Either way, I'm very much enjoying this dialogue.

[Connie Bensen]

Can one of you video moguls do a video of the conversation at dinner tonite so we can hear the rest of the discussion? :) enjoy!

[Mike Keliher]

I am inclined to agree with Aaron's perspective and will build upon his ideas here. You say:

"Brands are inanimate intangible things. They are contrivances intended to make you feel some sort of emotion about a company or it's icons."

I would say that paragraph should be prefaced with a "Traditionally, ..."

Brands are traditional a "contrivance" of marketers hoping to evoke a certain emotion about a company or product in response to a "brand experience" of some sort.

Companies like Dell, though, are slowly, piece by piece, starting to change that, with people-driven tools like IdeaStorm.

And of course, as you even admitted yourself in the comments above, there is such a thing as a "personal brand." As companies are increasingly represented to the public by more than the CEOs and spokespeople - as companies' "brand control" goes public - those brands start to become "personal brands on behalf of a company."

[Jeremiah Owyang]

Shel

Thanks for having burgers and suds with me last night. Your wisdom and guidance is really helpful, I've got your messages in my brain (and you understand my rationalizations) and will be mulling them over the next few days, I recognize your points, and why it's important.

still a student.

[Jim Minatel]

I'm mostly with Chris Webb on this. While a "brand" can't be social, people are social on behalf of the brand. Chris's activity on twitter and facebook represent the Wrox brand. I think my blogging efforts have been more recognized for people seeing "oh, there's this Wrox editor blogging" and that's about the brand, than about "Jim Minatel blogger." It's a fine distinction.

[Morad Rayyan]

It really depends on the brand itself. And I mean the business it is in, a brand can be friendly if it is already in the business of talking / communicating to people, such as TV / Radio networks. Example, CNN can be in a social community offering its services such as UGC (User Generated Content / Citizen Journalism) as a brand and still be accepted as one in the community for its interactivity.

But then, AT&T or GE cannot deliver such a valuable thing to the community, so then it won't work for them...

So it all depends on type of brand.

[Tom O'Brien]

Josh B has re-opened this conversation - and I have a post up here about the Purists vs. the Corporatists:

http://humanvoice.wordpress.com/2008/03/11/purists-vs-corporatists/

TO'B