When online tech news giant Mashable decided that there should be a Social Media Day, there was one. Their Facebook page explained it: “As far as we know, there is no official Social Media Day. But we do think there should be one. So we invite you to celebrate the revolution of media becoming a social dialogue by attending or organizing a Social Media Day meetup in your area on June 30. What better way to celebrate social media than connecting with other enthusiasts in your area?”

The glass is either half full of lemmings or business people networking. At the two Social Media Day events I attended, there was a lot of learning and business happening: Learning about social media, tools, ideas and best practices. The sharing of questions, answers and ideas by new and long-time social media practitioners from different industries alike kept conversations lively and interesting.

This was the first Tweetup for Emily, also known as @eberg910, who attended a Social Media Day event at a Manchester, New Hampshire restaurant. “I’m starting to love interacting through social media. This was something new for me and I’m trying to get involved in different social media communities and I thought the tweetup would be a great start.” Her friend Maddy (@Mastaub ) found “It’s surprisingly easy to talk to people if you’ve been following their tweets, because you already know a lot about what they do and who they are.”

Organizer of one of the largest Social Media Day events on the planet in Boston, Massachusetts, Joselin Mane (@BostonTweetup) understands what Maddy is talking about. The biggest advantage to a social media event or tweetup, according to Mane, is that you can start building relationships before the event. “In these types of meetups, you know going into the event who will be there [as the registration is listed online]. You can check their credentials, blog and Facebook page so you can connect with them before the event. It facilitates better relationship building because you can leverage the time before the event. What’s cool is that if you know one person and they know several people, it enhances the experience and you don’t feel like an outsider.” This also secures longer lasting friendships and business relationships.

Mane, and the other organizers had just over a week to pull a venue and agenda together. Since @BostonTweetup has helped organize these events before, their connections helped it secure the venue and grow quickly “because that’s what we do.”

The night was successful for Emily. “I was able to meet local people who are doing the same things I’m learning about and trying to do myself. Being more active on Twitter is something I’m trying to figure out so it was really beneficial for me to meet people who are already pros at it.”

Maddy found the same: “I’ve found that people who are using Twitter for social meeting marketing purposes tend to be interesting and involved people. I wanted to hear about what some of the most innovative people in my community were up to. It was a success on all counts!”

Sarah Ellison got a chance to explore those and many other issues at her own employer when she undertook to write War at the Wall Street Journal. Originally assigned to cover the sale of her own newspaper to Rupert Murdoch for the pages of the Journal, Ellison ultimately expanded her project to be a book about the lead up to and immediate aftermath of the sale of Dow Jones to News Corp.

This book has a little bit of everything. There’s family intrigue as the author shines some light on the dynamics of the Bancroft family. The dynamics of this motley group of wealthy media heirs alone makes for interesting reading – yet it is just one piece of the story. The portrait of the tension between money, legacy, and pride maintains a sense of mystery even as we know the eventual outcome.

Ultimately, the family history gives way to hardball business wrangling. Here we get an inside look at the mechanics of big bucks mergers and acquisitions on Wall Street. The maneuvering of investment bankers, lawyers, board members, executives and others shows everyone looking out for their own interests – some with more success than others.

Most do not come out looking good at the end of the day. There are no true heroes. Rupert Murdoch himself is a stereotypical rich, old, pampered mogul. The perception of the Australian billionaire media titan as a cutthroat, scheming media titan is reinforced. Dow Jones CEO Peter Kann is an ineffectual former journalist desperate to hang on to the paper’s history. His successor, Rich Zannino, seems to be a young numbers wonk in over his head and eager to sell and run. The Bancroft family members are one part naïve, one part greedy, and a final part spoiled. Ellision’s fellow reporters and editors at the Wall Street Journal seem detached from modern media reality and certain of their own superiority as journalists. Marcus Brauchli, the successor to long-serving and well-respected Managing Editor Paul Steiger, is portrayed as largely ineffectual because he spends so much time trying to please his new master but ultimately fails, like so many before him, to win Murdoch’s affection.

Once the Bancroft family and Dow Jones board comes to the only reasonable conclusion and agrees to  sell to Rupert Murdoch for more than $5 billion – about double the prevailing market value at the time of the offer – the story changes to one of a newspaper company trying to succeed in a new media world.

It becomes clear at this point in the book that Murdoch and his minions at News Corp don’t have the unmistakably clear competitive vision that their reputation might suggest. We see Murdoch himself admitting he can argue both sides of the question of what type of stories make most sense in the WSJ. His editorial maven, Robert Thomson, becomes Managing Editor for the paper but doesn’t seem to be able to explain exactly what he wants to do.

When it comes to the Big Question of online media – to charge for content or not – Murdoch flip-flops. First he argues for all wsj.com content to be free; then when presented with financial data from the bean counters at Dow Jones, he reverses course. As we know, today he is a powerful advocate for online subscription fees.

War at the Wall Street Journal makes for an interesting read if you’re interested in business, media, or family dynasties. Definitely worth picking up or downloading a copy.

Chip Griffin is Chief Digital Officer for DCI Group, a Washington, DC public affairs firm. The views expressed are his own. This article originally appeared at PardonTheDisruption.com and is reprinted here with permission.

Additional Resources:

• War at the Wall Street Journal at Amazon.com
• Sarah Ellison’s web site

Last week, I had the good fortune to be “volcationing” with 8,000 of the world’s most creative and innovative kids. They came from just about every state and from a number of the 31 countries in which the non-profit Destination ImagiNation has educational programs. This was their Global Finals event.

The kids in the program have learned to take a team of up to seven of their peers (who they may or may not like), learn each other’s individual strengths and weaknesses, develop and leverage their collective creativity, teamwork, and problem solving skills. This alone would be tough for some workplaces to successfully pull off.

These teams face Challenges, all of which are rooted national learning standards as well as disciplines including mechanical/technical design, science, the arts, improvisation or structural/architectural design. There’s even a Challenge with a positive social outcome.

The big plus for these kids is that the team has to do it all by themselves. Yes, 2^nd graders are managing these projects, budgets and timelines. So are high school and college students and everyone in between. This is the beginning of the process of getting creative results that are hidden.

Over several months, student teams learn to identify and leverage their strengths through a variety of different methods, there is – I must admit – fun involved. Sometimes there are copious amounts of fun.  This should be no different for businesses – it works. In either business or “DI,” it also hides some of process that leads to innovation. When the brainstorming and problem solving gets going, every team will inevitably get stuck. How a team learns to react to adversity, ambiguities and half-baked ideas, in my opinion, will determine not only how far the team will go in competition, but in life.

It is this growth, this part of the process, which is most hidden and makes the process almost impossible to explain. The value isn’t just in the solution. Rather it is in evolving into a team that is capable of many solutions. It is also becoming an individual who can facilitate these results from others. THESE are the life skills that we need to value and can bring education to the next level.

I have seen items lost in couches come alive, heart-tugging performances about war where all the props, including full-size sets fit in a 2’ by 4’ box. I’ve seen amazing robotics and musical solutions to rival Broadway. I’ve seen amazing inventions that just spoke for themselves. Most important, I’ve seen kids continuing to look for new answers to old questions. I’ve seen hundreds use the lessons of their accomplishments on college essays and beyond.

Frequently, it is not until competition day that you can realize how amazing some of these solutions are – and no two are alike despite working on the same Challenge. As a long time volunteer at the state and international levels, and as an emerging media consultant, I can say working with the “adults” of Destination ImagiNation is just like working with the kids: invigorating, inclusive and fast-paced. And also frequently fun.

Amid the lasers, pyrotechnics, spotlights and cameras from Opening and Closing Ceremonies at Global Finals, the celebration is the same of that at the state/provincial or regional competitions: The lessons and value is in the process that leads to having a team capable of frequent innovation. This is the part that is hard to describe and frequently invisible.

Today’s challenges demands that we start seeing the possibilities like these students.

Picture this: you walk into a restaurant and the waiter has an Apple iPad that allows him to wirelessly and easily place your order, without error.  After your meal, you pay immediately using the iPad and Square application being developed by a co-founder of Twitter.  After doing so, the waiter leaves the device with you with a screen automatically up to review and rate the service and food, and distributes this feedback to services like Google, Yelp, Foursquare and others.  We can even take this one step further, and say an application on the iPad will reference what you ordered and suggest dessert or coffee shops nearby and give you the reviews for each of these, if applicable.

With that said, we can only image future possibilities for all other industries.

Some may consider this technology straight out of science fiction, but it is becoming real right in front of our eyes.  Consider the possibilities for advertising and big business – but also for startups and new markets this will create.

Magazines will become interactive; a great example of this is the Wired Magazine mock-up for the iPad. The New York Times demonstrated an app for the iPad during the announcement that allows the newspaper to become interactive. This is certainly the direction media is headed, and in the future will be consumed.

Social media as we currently know it will be further ingrained in our daily lives.  Smart businesses will use this information as a way to start conversations with potential prospects and customers alike.  In particular by making advertising interactive, we could quickly speak with representatives from companies that are advertising.  If after seeing an interactive Ford Motors ad you decide you want more information, you can instantly have a brochure sent to you on that model. Then, perhaps a representative will contact you over Twitter–or any other medium–that provides a lot of value and power to not only manufacturers but the advertising industry.

Thus far we have talked a lot about print, in various forms, and ways the iPad could revolutionize the industry.  But how about television, or music?

With services such as Netflix and Hulu expanding across more networks it will only be a matter of time before we can stream all content to our mobile devices like the iPad.  Comcast and Time Warner Cable are mulling over streaming services as a way to allow their customers access to TV programming on the go.  When we dive more into that, just think that if you could not make it home for your favorite TV show, you could instead take your iPad out and start watching on the go!  It is innately powerful to be able to carry all your media, or at least have access to all of it from anywhere at anytime.

The next few years will be interesting as new developments start to emerge, social trends, digital streaming technology and content network deals.  I look forward to seeing the coming technology and how it will further revolutionize how we consume and interact with media in our day-to-day lives.

Next week, I’ll be writing additional columns to cover the news from Austin, Texas, home of SXSW (South by SouthWest). This is the massive tradeshow that plainly states “The Future Starts Here.” Not only should the information be interesting (and fun), but you need to start looking at this information in a different light: “How will this affect me?” Unlike the beginning of the fad called the Internet that took years to settle into the lives of many, the new future is moving crazy-fast.

“The Cloud” I was speaking of is the standard metaphor for what happens in the Internet. Each day, more applications are running in the invisible Cloud rather than in our computers. ZOHO and Google docs were among the early players, but they have already been joined by new players. Meanwhile, everyone’s applications are getting more powerful – and in many cases, easier to use. Microsoft will announce the arrival date of their new Microsoft Office 2010 product – which is expected to offer the option of running without software on your computer, in the cloud.

Salesforce is an example of Customer Relationship Management, or CRM, software that runs in the cloud that makes a virtual salesforce easier to manage. There really is no end to the possibilities here.

Now take all the powerful software I just talked about and put it on your cell phone. Forget that you may or may not want to use it on a cell phone – it’s there already, or on its way. Today, there are two types of executive phones: Blackberry devices and iPhone or Android-based devices. Once, the cellular telephone was an “executive only” tool. Today, a Retrevo poll shows “28% of people think kids should have their own cell phone between the ages of 9 and 12.” Don’t worry. Sixty-eight percent of the respondents thought 13-18 was a better age.

On second thought, you can worry a little. Facebook, among other sites, will be adding more geolocation features that can identify your position. Google Buzz, launched the other week adds geolocation and social chat features within their gMail e-mail client. Granted, with parental controls, this could be a great thing, and perhaps not. I’ll have more details on this in my SXSW pieces and you can decide for yourself.

A few of you doubted me in the comments last year when I started talking about a single sign-on for multiple web sites. Engagement-centric identity company Janrain reports that Google, Facebook and Yahoo! are the big three when it comes to single-sign on platform. Hundreds of millions use it each month to sign onto other sites other than just those three. For the record, Twitter is fourth largest single-sign on site. This means more personal information, preferences and attitudes can passed between sites to better determine how to give you a better site experience (or perhaps something less noble, depending on the site).

Individually, a social web with location means you must now know what you can share and what you should not. As a business it means sharing personally and honestly, and not like a traditional business. You really need to engage your customers.

Marketing to demographic groups is well on its way out, and engaging with individuals is on its way into the mainstream. This also means creating a new set of measurements to help grow your business. Naturally, there will be a slew of next-generation measurement tools being announced next week as well.

Enjoy the leaks of information now. Next week by this time, the floodgates of information should be open for all of us to digest.

In other words, speaking and interacting with your customers are the new leads.

This may sound like “flat is the new up,” but it is different – the whole marketing world is changing. Look at all the smart phones out there. A recent article about Verizon Wireless 4G speed may have these phones going faster than home Internet. (My phone is already faster than my broadband). This means businesses (or all customers) can or will be able to buy anywhere, anytime. And more are joining these ranks literally every hour.

Michael Greene on the Forrester blog does a pretty good job of describing the talking points:

He explains that over the next five years, Forrester sees a doubling of interactive marketing to $4.8 billion by 2014. “That’s no number to sneeze at,” states Greene, “but what impresses me most is that historically conservative B2B marketers are not only investing in interactive marketing, but actually shifting budget towards online channels.”

He brings up three touchstone points: B2B interactivity will bring tangible results; digital isn’t just for sourcing leads anymore; and B2B marketers can’t ignore social media.

“Even more than their B2C counterparts, B2B interactive marketers are highly focused on channels that deliver tangible business results,” according to Greene. This means turning interactive data points to identify who is really interested in your product or services. This could mean trouble for traditional marketing channels like catalog and mailing lists. No wonder CoTweet, a CRM interface for Twitter used by Ford (among others) was just purchased by email marketing firm ExactTarget.

Forrester finds that paid search is still at the top of the B2B marketers’ spend, while display ads, mobile, and social media are exploding.

This becomes, in my judgment, the slippery slope that we saw when the Internet was new. Some of the best-known companies took their print ads and literally moved them onto the web. PLOP. Just stick it on that page. When that didn’t work, some fired their web teams because it became clear that you could not sell on the web. Enter Amazon to prove they were wrong. Not just a little wrong, but really, really wrong.

I see companies making the same mistake, especially with content, usability, and metrics. Some are cramming their sales in social media channels but are missing the larger point. Customers want to have a conversation with the company, or perhaps just a question answered. The new world demands accessibility and not just pasting your big Photoshop ad on a small cell phone screen. Sure, branding and maintaining a recognizable look and feel are important, but you need to remember how the media is being used, how people are interacting with the content and what they expect as an outcome.

I have a vivid picture in my mind of Marshall McLuhan (“the medium is the message”) throwing up his hands and walking away because so many business people refuse to change gears to see what the customer needs, thinks, wants, and in the case of social media, is saying about your company.

McLuhan would, on occasion use the pun, the “mess age.” And he was writing about the television era in the mid 1960s. It is apparently every bit as relevant today.

Scott Monty who runs the social media program at Ford said this on his personal blog: “When you start hearing about social media taking up more budget rather than having to struggle for dollars and attention, it’s clear that the practice is gaining in legitimacy.”  And that is indeed becoming the case.

I have ranted about two of the nation’s (U.S.) largest retailers having good Facebook pages, but no way to ask questions or get help on Facebook. So I bought somewhere else feeling like I was being ignored in their “store.”

Customers and prospects are demanding answers on their terms, be it on Twitter, Facebook, NING or a phone call, which is more likely now made from a cellular phone. Our new job as B2B marketers is to reach out and hold conversations with customers, develop relationships and analytics to identify which will provide what our company is seeking to achieve (without ticking off any of the other customers). Or more simply, when it comes to chatting with the customer, “Love the One You’re With.”

The question, which sounds as obvious as “how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll lollipop” was tweeted by David Snowden of Cognitive Edge from the Henley Knowledge Management Forum in the U.K.

It is questions like these that drive knowledge management, or “KM” professionals crazy. (Not just you.)

I first met David when I was on the KM team at Intel, and he was a KM thought leader for IBM. No question, social media, and in this case Twitter has made the world a smaller place.

We have all been forced into using systems that try to make us behave in a certain way, which is generally counter-intuitive. The system may be from our company or a company that we do business with.  In almost every case, the reason they are driving us nuts is that it should make it easier for THEM to do something. In fact, the Ugly Bear of Unintended Consequences rears its ugly head to make everyone’s life worse.

Enter knowledge management to tame the bear and enable your engagement into the process, not suffer through it.

Knowledge management is, to clarify, the practices of capturing, codifying, reusing and measuring how the information is applied. In my model, it also becomes a cycle, where the business must react to the measurements of how the knowledge is applied, because knowledge is a dynamic force that keeps evolving.

In a society where content is growing at a faster pace seemingly every minute, it makes sense that content is only as good as its ability to be applied.

Knowledge is different than just data. Knowledge is (arguably) information with application or context. It may be unquantifiable, but many elements of a lesson are able to be measured.  Interaction with step-by-step instructions solving a specific issues are a good example. There’s value in the steps and knowing how they are used.

Companies that have a web site with a carefully managed knowledgebase can leverage the shared community knowledge to be the subject matter expert on the web site, even if they are not the market leader.

Let me call that out again, the non-market leader CAN grow market share by storing knowledge. For example, the once little-known CNET tech news web site grew to selling technical specs to eCommerce sites and making millions. Smaller telecom companies became the market leader by becoming the information “go-to” source for their market segment. All they did was explain new technology at the lowest common terms.

You need to pay attention to how users interact with your content, and that means detailed analytics. Not just with which documents they use, but to determine what they are doing with the document’s content. In the past, I have found that pairing analytics with a third-party call center to confirm this information very useful in getting unbiased results.  Now, mouse tracking analytics may serve part of that need.

Armed with statistically significant data, you can then develop the knowledgebase to help the majority of your customers fall in love with you. If you can solve major problems with your content, and measure that content usage to determine what the next problem will be, then you can head off your customer’s issues BEFORE it haunts you both. That means customers will find the answers on your web site. If theyt do, why would they buy elsewhere?

But what if you were the customer: Why would you NOT want the information you need to solve your problem at your fingertips? Trust me, your customer sure does. That’s why it makes sense to support the resources to develop, measure and continue to develop the content and interface you need to become your market leader.

With one company in my past, we made every prospective employee write a step-by-step document of how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. We taught step by step documentation writing to everyone in the company at all our locations. We shared the ownership of this project with everyone. Within a year, we went from 20 knowledge contributors to over 500 document contributors, and that included the administrative assistants. They learned information about the products and shared it.

For the record, yes, this start-up became the market leader.

There are a lot of good and nearly free platforms that can be used for this. What is vital is that your system is designed to engage your customers, not just the price tag. You can keep The Bear at bay. Every day analysis must be done on data usage and the system needs constant reevaluation that is based on data, and not a “gut feeling.”

After all, did you ever see what’s in a gut?

Some of the more popular social media platforms to consider using are:

- Facebook

- Twitter

- Myspace

- YouTube

- Wordpress (Blog)

- Tumblr (Blog)

1. Research & Decide: Social media does not mean that you need to use each tool to be successful. Do some research and decide which tools are best for you – and which you can keep active with. There is more potential of hurting your brand if you sign up for a service, and then never utilize it.

a. Some tips: If you are a good writer, try blogging or Facebook. If you would rather record audio or video, invest in the applicable tools and pursue that avenue instead.

b. Try out one tool until you begin to get good with it, and then start to use another.

2. Registration & Profiles: Ensure that you have registered for all the relevant social media tools you plan to use. It is also just as important as participating in social media as having a thorough profile. I will use Twitter for this example:

a. Twitter profiles are limited to 160 characters, so you have to use the space wisely. Ideally you should use this space to tell a little about the company, and remember to include a link to your company homepage.

3. Participate as a brand: Engage your twitter following by promoting useful, and relevant information that relates to your brand. However, I see too many companies simply talking “at” their following and not “with.” This is an important distinction and will be covered more as we go on in this list.

4. Participate as a person: More than ever people want to do business with other people. Register a personal account on whichever resource you have chosen, and use it to engage your community and help establish real relationships with others.

5. Follow your top 3 competitors: Be sure to follow and track what your top competitors are doing, and how their social media strategy is effective–and how it is not. You can use this to your advantage by addressing a weakness, or engaging in conversations on another platform that they are not using.

6. Establish a blog: There is almost nothing better (aside from your website) than a blog to help drive awareness and traffic to your website when you initially start. However, post on your blog! Once started do not let it idle. Your first post could even be about your current startup initiatives. One important note, install blogging software on your own site to help with these points. Here is some actionable advice:

a. Write a blog post on where your business currently stands, or how it got there. Be open and honest, the more you are transparent the more your readers will appreciate it.

b. Write about your market, where your company or products fits in that space and how it will improve or streamline the process.

c. Establish thought leadership by writing about practices in your industry and how you address them.

(Note: Here is a great list you should take a look at from Chris Brogan if you are just starting out.)

Whichever medium you decide to use, actively engage your audience. You can market to them as you have done traditionally (ex. offering coupons, promotions) but understand that people will look to your presence as a place to engage your brand with customer service, sales, etc. Be transparent with your audience by addressing problems quickly, and honestly and your following will appreciate it more so due to that.

In addition, what I meant by talking “at” your audience is that I see too many brands just utilizing their social media outlets to promote themselves and constantly talk about what they are doing. While it’s important to promote yourself, talk with others to make them feel comfortable with you, and make it easy to contact you.

In the Blog Council’s official announcement, Pearson, who is praised as one of the pioneers of successful social media programs at a global enterprise had this to say: “In the years ahead we will see social media evolve into a discipline that companies use throughout their organization – from marketing to technical support to human resources. ”

Pearson will be joining forces with Andy Sernovitz CEO of the Blog Council and creator of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, to focus the members of the blog council on “ROI, ethics, creating management policies and effectively utilizing the many tools and software platforms available today.”  According to his interview with GasPedal, Pearson envisions his role in the future of the blog council as a return to the original focus of the organization “I want to join and help this become the best place for people to actually learn in real time to help their own companies. I think that was the initial mission of the Blog Council and I want to do my part to help accelerate it.”

When the web was new, early web stats were frequently misinterpreted with marketing people getting excited about the number of page views rather than how people were interacting with the content. Learning your user’s intent, problems and successes, and measuring those trends (and reacting quickly) help to create more responsive companies. Navigation, search terms and especially content can be quickly updated to maximize a visitor’s experience on your site.

Our grandparents would talk to their neighbors about which stores they liked, and why. And when they were treated badly at a store – WOW. That conversation could go on forever. (Some neighbors were fun to watch when they were THAT mad). The simple power of word of mouth can help responsive companies grow, and lesser companies to disappear. Today, the community is global, connected by users sharing conversations in real-time on any number of social networks.

How fast is word of mouth? Ask Motrin, who had to cancel a full ad campaign based on a weekend of their Mommy Motrin backlash. It was so bad, at one point; the Motrin.com web site was pulled down.

The basic unit of word of mouth communication is a conversation. Today, conversations can be based in text, video or audio -or all of them. Still, sharing pertinent content in a conversation is the unit of value.

When all else fails, let’s try doing this with math. A simple ROI formula is:
ROI = (benefits realized – cost for benefits) / (cost for benefits)

That formula works mathematically. When conversations are the benefit realized in the formula, with exponential growth on a well managed social media program, this formula becomes so “industrial economy.”

Call centers (or contact centers) measure the number of calls going out and coming in to the center. The length of time is documented and is frequently a metric for their employees. Why? Because conversations of mutual interest are effective at meeting the individual’s needs with a product or solution.

What is the difference between a phone conversation and an online conversation? The phone?

Actually, it is a bit more complex. There is a level of trust that exists when someone calls into a company. When using social media, that level of trust has to be built and managed.

Many executives (but clearly not all) are effectively using the microsharing site, Twitter. They can get real time information from their customers – and their prospective customers. Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh, Ford’s Scott Monty, and PerkettPR Chief Executive Christine Perkett are all on board and recognize the need to be human and not all business.

In return, their followers have access to company executives or customer service: another reason for being active in social media.

As I’m writing, Zappos’ Hsieh “tweeted” – a comment on Twitter: “After watching 20,000 Leagues, I had nightmares of giant squids chasing me, which then turned into pack of wolves. What are your nightmares?”

The point: They realize being approachable (and human) is as key as the conversations that make them “knowledge economy” executives. Measuring the benefits of those conversations are still difficult, to say the least.

Many web analysts differ on their approach to measuring social media, but several truths are emerging. Followers (or friends) are not the same as influence, and influence is not the same as participation. When is a conversation pertinent? What is the value of each chat is still unclear. Metrics are being tested as fast as the platforms are being upgraded. Work is now being done on more complex measurements that would allow users to weigh which conversations and words are likely to be more productive for future positive gains.

Complexities are standard with measuring resultant human behavior. What is the right depth of a conversation? Are people talking about a topic, product or just finishing lines of a movie? Could the movie conversation be better for your business than that of the product? There is a lot of research to do, and no doubt, we’ll see some well-financed snake-oil solutions soon.

Remember the person in your first job who was all business, all the time? They were great at what they did, but not very social. Today, being social could mean generating a lifetime personal advocate for your products.

Motrin is a case study on why being plugged into the conversation is important. Ford had a “bad press” incident, but thanks to quick moving social media manager Scott Monty, they were able to quickly get their message to the masses instead of losing sales at a bad time. If you don’t recall hearing about the Ford incident, that’s because they were in a position to share their point of view and resolve it in less than 24 hours. In the follow-up case study, several conclusions were drawn, including “companies don’t talk, people do.”

Measuring ROI can be viewed as a measure of efficiency – a best practice.

Dr. Peter Drucker, the father of modern management may have put it best: “Efficiency is doing things right; effectiveness is doing the right things.”