For the second time this year, Cameron and I have presented to a classroom of students at the Art Institute of Atlanta. We are invited by our friend Larry Stultz, Department Chair at the Institute, to discuss real world implementation of Social Media Marketing.
As much as we are able to provide information to the students during these discussions (btw, we always have the group re-arrange the furniture into a circle so that we are discussing, not presenting), we are able to get back just as much feedback on what is working for this particular demographic.
This week on Overflow we discuss our impressions of social media networks through the eyes of this group of students.
The most prominent feedback was the widespread immersion in the use of Facebook versus the total disregard of Twitter. The take away seemed to be that Twitter was just another place that needed updating, and everyone that needed to be kept abreast of their actions was already part of their Facebook network, so Twitter was just a duplicate task.
This finding is reinforced by an article in the New York Times just this week regarding the “driving force behind Twitter“.
The students were not aware of the search and conversation (hashtag) capabilities of Twitter that provides much of it’s value. They were also not aware of the acquisition of FriendFeed by Facebook at all, and the additional features that it will bring to the network, such as real time search.
This may also reflect the theory that at a young age, the most important measure of value is to have a popular group of friends. Everything that a young person does revolves around friends and family, precisely the type of influencer relationships found on Facebook. Twitter tends to be more self promotional, news gathering, research driven, and less concerned with relationships. The difference between the use of Facebook and Twitter may simply come down to the hard wiring of age.
We did get into the topic of job search and employers use of social networks to review the “character” of potential hires. Of course, the students felt that it was not a fair assessment but agreed that some form of constraint must be applied when posting on line. They believe that at some point in the future the playing field will be balanced where both employers and employees will have things in their lifestream demonstrating questionable behavior.
The other big take away element from our conversation was the complete lack of circling back around after an online transaction to leave a comment or a rating. It actually didn’t seem to occur to the group to participate in the dialogue surounding their interaction with the product or service. Again, it seemed to be deemed another task that was not important to them.
We tried to emphasize the importance of using comments in a number of ways. In one sense, it will help them to get discovered as a “personal brand” as they look for employment after graduation, particularly if they can point to a large number of quality blog posts and comment discussions about relevant topics. It is also important to them as consumers. They admitted to having ratings influence a buying decision, so it only stands to reason that they would have better results if there was a larger pool of ratings to review. Growing the percentage within their demographic who are willing to take the time to rate an item will help to build up more meta data, providing more relevant feedback when it comes time to search and transact.
The only time someone in the class had actually gone through the process of leaving a rating was based upon a tourism experience, and it was encouraged by the property. We addressed this issue in our Overflow podcast called Make the Offline Ask.
The last bit of insight that they were able to impart, was their preference to have an interaction with a brand if there was a way to make it more “personal”. A character or a spokesperson who was speaking through the Facebook Fan Page was going to get their attention more than an impersonal brand. Examples might include the Burger King King and the e-Trade Baby.
Once again, we’d like to thank the class for having us in to discuss Social Media. If you are interested in having us speak or present to a class please send an email to jmagennis@ befluid.com.
The opening and closing theme for the Overflow Podcast is called The Information Age, by Anthony Fiumano and you can find it at the Podsafe Music Network.
You can subscribe to The Overflow Podcast directly from ITunes by following this link, and we would be happy to receive listener feedback and ratings at The ITunes Store.
The Tattoo Argument
by joemagennis on August 28, 2009
For the second time this year, Cameron and I have presented to a classroom of students at the Art Institute of Atlanta. We are invited by our friend Larry Stultz, Department Chair at the Institute, to discuss real world implementation of Social Media Marketing.
As much as we are able to provide information to the students during these discussions (btw, we always have the group re-arrange the furniture into a circle so that we are discussing, not presenting), we are able to get back just as much feedback on what is working for this particular demographic.
This week on Overflow we discuss our impressions of social media networks through the eyes of this group of students.
The most prominent feedback was the widespread immersion in the use of Facebook versus the total disregard of Twitter. The take away seemed to be that Twitter was just another place that needed updating, and everyone that needed to be kept abreast of their actions was already part of their Facebook network, so Twitter was just a duplicate task.
This finding is reinforced by an article in the New York Times just this week regarding the “driving force behind Twitter“.
The students were not aware of the search and conversation (hashtag) capabilities of Twitter that provides much of it’s value. They were also not aware of the acquisition of FriendFeed by Facebook at all, and the additional features that it will bring to the network, such as real time search.
This may also reflect the theory that at a young age, the most important measure of value is to have a popular group of friends. Everything that a young person does revolves around friends and family, precisely the type of influencer relationships found on Facebook. Twitter tends to be more self promotional, news gathering, research driven, and less concerned with relationships. The difference between the use of Facebook and Twitter may simply come down to the hard wiring of age.
We did get into the topic of job search and employers use of social networks
to review the “character” of potential hires. Of course, the students felt that it was not a fair assessment but agreed that some form of constraint must be applied when posting on line. They believe that at some point in the future the playing field will be balanced where both employers and employees will have things in their lifestream demonstrating questionable behavior.
The other big take away element from our conversation was the complete lack of circling back around after an online transaction to leave a comment or a rating. It actually didn’t seem to occur to the group to participate in the dialogue surounding their interaction with the product or service. Again, it seemed to be deemed another task that was not important to them.
We tried to emphasize the importance of using comments in a number of ways. In one sense, it will help them to get discovered as a “personal brand” as they look for employment after graduation, particularly if they can point to a large number of quality blog posts and comment discussions about relevant topics. It is also important to them as consumers. They admitted to having ratings influence a buying decision, so it only stands to reason that they would have better results if there was a larger pool of ratings to review. Growing the percentage within their demographic who are willing to take the time to rate an item will help to build up more meta data, providing more relevant feedback when it comes time to search and transact.
The only time someone in the class had actually gone through the process of leaving a rating was based upon a tourism experience, and it was encouraged by the property. We addressed this issue in our Overflow podcast called Make the Offline Ask.
The last bit of insight that they were able to impart, was their preference to have an interaction with a brand if there was a way to make it more “personal”. A character or a spokesperson who was speaking through the Facebook Fan Page was going to get their attention more than an impersonal brand. Examples might include the Burger King King and the e-Trade Baby.
Once again, we’d like to thank the class for having us in to discuss Social Media. If you are interested in having us speak or present to a class please send an email to jmagennis@ befluid.com.
The opening and closing theme for the Overflow Podcast is called The Information Age, by Anthony Fiumano and you can find it at the Podsafe Music Network.
You can subscribe to The Overflow Podcast directly from ITunes by following this link, and we would be happy to receive listener feedback and ratings at The ITunes Store.
Tagged as: AIA, comment systems, Facebook, students, Twitter