Though I’ve attended Search Engine Strategies conferences since 2001, I’m really enjoying and learning from Danny Sullivan’s search series, SMX, Search Marketing Expo. I attended SMX Advanced in Seattle this year and last week attended the SMX Social Media series in New York. We’ve been talking about social media marketing for about 3 years now, it had been pre-dominantly embraced by the 18-30 year old male demographic. It has now become a powerful venue for communication in niche and micro communities and people are coming up with some really smart ways to leverage the medium. Of course there are spammers who muddy the water and try to turn social media marketing into just one more unwanted advertising venue. Here are some topline items of discussion to help you start thinking about how to use SMM to raise awareness of your site.

The Good:
The web is such an enormous place and Social Networking sites have made it very easy to locate sites, blogs and communities that share your interests and needs online. Say you like wine (okay, let’s say I like wine;) and we have a wine client. I spend time at blogs such as wine camp and social networking sites such as corkd. These communities are superbly rich with wine content that is unique, interesting and helpful. They share wine reviews, recipes, wine events, harvest information and wine tasting recommendations. It’s enormously helpful to go to a handful of sites or blogs and get updates on wine scores, up and coming vintners, new recipes and events. It’s a great way to aggregate all of the best there is for wine content. This is the good of social media marketing. The good allows us to be privy to the best, most relevant, most illuminating content on the web.

The Bad:
Social media marketing is an open forum for discussion, content and links. Because link popularity is an important element of search optimization, it can also be a free for all of links to obscure viagra and cialis sites that have less-than-nothing to do with the social networking site you’re visiting. That’s the bad. Shame on them, propagators of this kind of activity should all be flogged. That said, think about your intention when you become involved in a social networking site. I have an interest in wine communities, I represent a wine client and if I spend my time on wine blogs pushing my client and their special of the week, I would be next for flogging. But if I spend time reading blogs, commenting fairly on cork’d about the 07′ harvest of Oregon Pinot Noir or sharing my grandmother’s pumpkin shrimp saute recipe (that by the way pairs beautifully with my clients’ 06′ Pinot Gris) then I’m being a good member of my community. Social networking is much like starting a friendship. What do you want from me and how can you add value? If you meet me in a coffee shop and start telling me all your problems and ask me to help you move I’m probably not going to get to know you, but if you meet me in a coffee shop and we’re friends for awhile and you add value to my life as a friend and you need help moving, I’ll be there for you. The bad is when people leave comment on social networking sites with total disregard for propriety and good manners.

The Ugly:
Okay, now I’m taking the gloves off. Spammers and black hat SEO’s should be flogged (did I mention that?) I have a corporate client for which we do monthly press releases. This last week, one of our releases was hi-jacked. This entry appeared under a tail search term for my client:

Avery® Print and Mail Center Announces ‘Direct Mail Dish’ Blog …
This site may harm your computer.
Avery Print and Mail Center (PMC), the direct marketing group of Avery … How to Self Direct Retirement Funds Into Real Estate (PR Newswire via Yahoo! …
blogged.sbmarketingservices.com/blogs/ how-to-direct-mail/112554/avery-print-and-mail/ -

Okay, couple of problems. Notice Google addition to this entry This site may harm your computer. not a message a company with an exceptional reputation wants to be associated with. Though the title even shows the registered mark, this BS marketing blog tries to create a relationship between our direct mail blog and some real estate scheme. Legal departments are involved and it will get resolved, but let me ask-what is the point? People aren’t stupid, this company has less-than-nothing to do with retirement real estate. How can hijacking someone else’s unrelated content be helpful to you?

Vertical Response, a very highly respected Email Marketing Program, had their site hi-jacked and were pummeled with some very bad PR (because someone thought this spammed up, hi-jacked site belonged to them). They are a classy outfit and handled the situation quickly and graciously, but what a nightmare.

The internet is still relatively new and all of these hi-jacking, spamming, trademark issues are just beginning to have real world solutions and frankly it’s a nightmare if you’re ever on the wrong side of the spam. This kind of ugliness is reprehensible and unfathomable. Social media marketing, blogs and other easily editable sites have opened the door to content hijacking and all forms of desperate marketing ploys. This is the ugly. The ugly is when you ask for everything and you’re willing to give nothing.

The Fun:
Now we can talk about the fun. An agency representing Comedy Central presented at the show. In a session for Wikipedia, he outlined how Comedy Central leverages comments and additions to Wikipedia for South Park. They let brand evangelists share the message and Wikipedia and its’ guest are the better for it. Consumers trust the information because it isn’t coming from some big PR firm, it’s coming from the guy who has faithfully watched the show, gets the characters and shares fact about the program. This is the fun! How refreshing to see social media marketing at its’ best.

The take away? Let’s do our best to be good social networking citizens, just as we work to be good friends. Comment fairly and appropriately, be a good friend online and your friendship, good content and fair intent will be rewarded.

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