5 Ways The Digital World & Social Media Are Changing What Is "Real"
06/17/2010
How do you define real in a world that too often seems to be like the illusion of a magic act? Dictionary.com defines "real" (as a noun) as something that actually exists.
A tweet is here today and gone tomorrow. Take down a server and your post may disappear. Is it the vapor trail that makes it real?
Does it .. whatever "it" may be .. need to be tangible to be real? Recently my eBook, Social Media Marketing GPS, was turned down to be included in a list of books about social media because it was not "professionally published and printed and available for purchase on amazon.com." Now everyone has the right to set their own guidelines of course but .. was the gentleman really saying it was not a real book? The oxymoron was the list was part of a digital publication.
I began to wonder .. how comfortable are our customers in the digital world? As experiences in online and offline worlds continue to blurr the idea of what is real is shifting. Here are 5 questions that might help you find the secrets to make your next social media magic act "real."
1. What is real for our customers? Books. An eBook, an iPad or Kindle book or a hard copy 'dead tree' book?
2. What is real for our customers? Relationships. Relationships begun in childhood, at work, on a commuter train or from a tweet or blog post?
3. What is real for our customers? Thought Leadership. Expertise reinforced through tweets, blog posts, Facebook status updates, traditional books or newspaper articles?
4. What is real for our customers? Education. Learning for free through digital posts, webinars, podcasts or in a paid class room settings?
5. What is real for our customers? Purchase Decisions. Purchase decision information and sights gained from people you know, the company or from strangers on Yelp, tweets, blog posts or tweets?
In her Twitter interview, from Social Media Marketing GPS, Liz Strauss, Successful Blog, tweeted - In the end doesn't it come down to who we are and how we define a REAL relationship?
Five years from now we probably won't be having this conversation; but for many organizations it's an important issue to address today. How do you define "real" in the 21st century digital world? More importantly, how do you customers define what is real?
