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Is social played-out yet?

In my experience, the social world is still growing. I think the baby boomer generation never really accepted social media (except for my dad, who loves to see what my brother and I are up to since we live far apart), gen x is still active with it, and the younger portion of gen y (2000s babies) are are too engulfed in to to realize what's going on outside. As gen y gets to the age where they are buying cars, social is going to be incredibly important. If you don't have a solid understanding of how social will affect buying decisions, you're setting yourself up for failure. People rely heavily on social recommendations. Even if they don't personally know someone, they'll trust their opinion & recommendation. I fully believe that any business that wants to succeed in the future needs to embrace social media as a branding & reputation tool, not as a sales outlet.
 
I see social engagement up. But maybe that's just with me, and maybe I just have overly socially active friends and colleagues.

Twitter is OK for local business if you're in a major metropolitan area. I find little use for it personally--never have.
 
Personally:

* Facebook: On a significant decline. I'm not a hater and it still serves a small purpose (my favorite bands posting photos) but overall, dwindling.

* Twitter: High engagement holding steady. Great to quickly digest local news, media, sports, events, and music.

* LinkedIn: Very high engagement. Use it to initiate (hold your breath) face to face human engagement. Just yesterday I grabbed lunch with a fellow tech Biz Dev guru that I have a lot in common with. I stumbled across him on LinkedIn and reached out for pure networking / idea sharing purposes. Also, early morning LinkedIn scrolling is great for snagging a couple good articles for the day.

* InstaGram: High engagement. Love it. Follow lots of close friends, sports, and my favorite bands.

* MySpace: a/S/lOcAtIoN????


For our company:

* Facebook: We like to keep up with it but with limited resources and mainly just to have an interesting presence for recruits and prospects.

* Twitter: See above

* LinkedIn: High engagement all around. We're bullish on the value of LinkedIn

* InstaGram: None

* MySpace: It's the future!
 
I am reading this thread thinking about Face Books most recent quarterly earning -- which suggest they finally figured out how to make money with their Mobile app. I am also thinking i missed a good opportunity to buy the stock at 23 recently. That being said, it will be interesting to see this evolve and understand what and how.
 
It seems that on a case by case everyone has a slightly different view on this topic.

As a foreigher it works well for me to stay in contact with my family abroad so they can see my kids photos and as a sports practitioner it allows my to keep up with events and other players.

However it hasn't (that I can recognize) influenced me much on direct purchasing decisions. What it has done is involved me indirectly in social events that resulted in purchasing decisions. I've recently signed to run the Spartan race and other similar events because they ran ads in my Facebook pages.

There is a way to play in Social Media.

As I think about this subject it also becomes clear to me the speed of recent change and the fact that regardless of what we write here today everything can change within just a few weeks, then we have to rethink our position.
 
I think social media is definitely on its way out, especially when it comes to businesses. I see this with both my dealership and my own personal businesses. Facebook is dying quickly, and I know several dozens of people who have closed out their accounts. With others, they ignore anything that has to do with business. People just don't want to be spammed whatsoever. I don't blame them as I don't like it either. With that being said, I do believe that review sites like Yelp! are on the rise. When people are ready to make a decision, they will steer over to these sites. If they find great reviews, they may want to do business with you. Those are also the folks who will return to those sites to leave another review. Therefore, your customer service better be top-notch if you want great reviews. ;)
 
I'm just sayin' maturing markets have their hallmarks, IMO, I see social is moving out of "sunday driver" mode and on to its permanent spot in our culture.

That's a good point to keep in mind. The usage has matured. Early on you could push anything out there and it was consumed to one extent or another. Then, FB's edgerank signaled a response to this social firehose and started filtering to enhance the user experience.

The big thing to marketers is that people are becoming more and more hardened against overt advertisements on social sites. Edgerank filtering pretty much obliterated the spray and pray marketing approach that worked a few years ago.

Social is a different animal and I'd say a lot of businesses end up losing money on it because they treat it and have expectations that it's going to generate sales/leads immediately. Treat social like branding and provide content that isn't overtly sales oriented and you'll pass the Edgerank filter and be there when your base has a need.

I'm going to tell you something most of you don't want to hear. As a consumer, auto dealerships are like the dentist. Unless you have a problem or going in for a check up you don't think or care about them. But, when you need a car to get to work or it won't make it down the driveway with out belching smoke you very much care about your local dealerships. And, who are you going to think about when that need arises; a dealership that you are regularly exposed to.

If all your post are sales related you'll never bee seen by all those Likers. Posts that fly under the Edgerank radar i.e. talking about local sporting events etc... are the fodder needed to establish a a beach head when you do hit them with a special sale, coupon, etc... . So if you're reading between the lines this means a ratio of community building to sales oriented posting.

So I agree with Joe. Social is part of our modern fabric and has a place in your marketing mix.
 
Is social played out yet? Absolutely not. The general public is getting wiser to the game, however.

With my personal use, I've gotten WAY more selective with who I follow on social media--if I'm not seeing a direct link between their sharing and my quality of life, I'll avoid them. It only takes a few unpleasant posts before the unlike/unfriend button gets clicked.

Though the gold rush for social media for businesses is starting to cool off, it's by no means over. I see a ton of similarities between the social media marketing "industry" and Multilevel Marketing concerns like Amway, in which the money wasn't really made by people selling soap, it was made by higher level distributors selling books, tapes, and conference tickets. In the social media industry, the real money doesn't come from people using social to sell more products, it's made by consultants selling the dream through half truths, filler, empty motivation, and quasi-spiritual principles.

The longer businesses keep poring over infographics in search of how to construct the perfect tweet or how to "stimulate" "engagement," they'll miss out on what's right in front of them--social media is just the next incarnation of the telephone which most of us aren't very good at speaking through yet. The big companies will continue to string you along with "tips" about community building for the purpose of ensnaring you in THEIR community, and nothing more.
 
FB definitely on the downswing for a lot of people. After a while the posts all start to look the same. Seen that, been there, done that, etc. and it just glazes the eyes over at times. When I do log in to check on latest friends or local happenings updates, the ads don't even register to me. I tried FB ads before on a few occasions and it was a bust. Google Display Network/Remarketing is much better and more cost effective to us than FB ever could hope to be for branding type advertising.

Having said that we keep a FB page and update it once or twice a week for our 500 likers and even occasionally will pay to boost a post about a community event we may host, just keeping it social and all. Also occasionally post for job openings, post a picture of the weather with some weather comment, etc., but really that's about all.

Twitter? nah.