Notorious R.O.B. – Conversations on Marketing, Technology, Real Estate

Buried within last week’s firestorm ignited by a couple of posts over at AgentGenius was an actually important issue that all social media practitioners and companies thinking about social media need to think about.

When is a company or an organization responsible for the social media actions of its employees?

Now, while I have gone to law school, and am a member of the Bar, I am not a lawyer, and what follows should not be construed as legal advice or any such thing.  Consult your own attorneys for their take on the issue.

From where I stand, I believe the answer will depend largely on three factors: (a) the employee’s “day job” responsibilities, (b) the “social media act” at issue, and (c) employer’s level of knowledge.  But this is a first stab, and I would love thoughts/comments from the readers, especially from those who are practicing attorneys.

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One of the finest online journals around is @Issue, which usually deals with topics surrounding design but with strong forays into advertising, marketing, and branding. I make sure to check up on it periodically, because of gems like this:

This amusing graphic is from Marty Neumeier’s book Zag: The No. 1 Strategy of High-Performance Brands (which I haven’t read yet but will be picking up on the strength of this post on @Issue — hey, social media marketing in action!).

The editors of @Issue note:

His book was published before social media caught on, so we don’t know how Twitter would fit into this comparison? Maybe a courtship between two emoticons.

So what would “7. Social Networking” look like?  Would it be any different from the six already here?  In some ways, it would be closest to #3 – Public Relations and #6 – Branding.  But there are elements that are missing; I’m trying to think of what those elements are.

Any thoughts out there in Notorious-Land?

-rsh

From Twitter itself (h/t: @mathurrell) comes this amazing piece of news:

Nearly one in five (19%) online Americans now uses Twitter or a similar service to post and share updates about themselves, or to see updates about others, according to the latest survey data from the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

This figure represents a significant increase over previous surveys that reported on Twitter use. Research in in December 2008 and April 2009 from Pew found that only 11% of internet users preported using a status-update service, while a similar study by Harris Interactive in March/April of 2009 found that number to be even lower, at 5%.

Let’s assume that the research is valid and accurate.  1 out of 5 is an amazing figure in and of itself.

There are, however, two other even more amazing observations that can be made if we take the 20% figure as valid.

First, we may be heading towards a self-balkanized America with no common shared cultural touchpoint.

If 19% of online Americans are on Twitter, and some 73% of all American adults are online (this is from 2006, by the way, so the actual number might be higher), and there are 304 million Americans of which 227.4 million are 18 years of age and older, what we get is that there are some 31.5 million Americans on Twitter.

Well, the #1 highest ranked Twitter user in terms of number of followers is one Ashton Kutcher, with 3.88 million followers or 12.3% of the total Twittering Americans.  That’s it.  in terms of news or information sources, CNN tops the list with 2.79 million followers, or 8.8%.

The implication is that Americans have formed a bunch of small cells of their friends, colleagues, people they know on Twitter — there is no Twitter user/company/whatever that commands the majority of the Americans using Twitter for whatever it is that they use it for.

If social networks is the future of information distribution and communication, then we’re likely headed into a society without a defining common shared source of information or culture.  We’re going to make references, allusions, and jokes that will become increasingly “insider info”.  Gamers will instantly know what other gamers are talking about, while art fans will be speaking mostly with other art fans.  Micro-fragmentation appears to be something we need to think about.

Second, maybe none of that micro-fragmentation stuff will matter because Americans are just plain too dumb to survive in a challenging world.

Here’s the top ten most popular (in terms of number of followers) users on Twitter:

1.  Ashton Kutcher (aplusk)
2.  Britney Spears (britneyspears)
3.  Ellen DeGeneres (TheEllenShow)
4.  CNN Breaking News (cnnbrk)
5.  Twitter (twitter)
6.  Kim Kardashian (KimKardashian)
7.  Ryan Seacrest (RyanSeacrest)
8.  Barack Obama (BarackObama)
9.  John Mayer (johncmayer)
10.  Oprah Winfrey (Oprah)

Seven of the Top Ten (eight if you include Barack Obama, Celebrity President) is an entertainer/celebrity.  Some are celebrities that are famous for being famous — Kim Kardashian for example.

If this is what Americans want, then that’s what Americans want.  Just don’t ask me to think the future is rosy and wonderful on this evidence.

-rsh

PS: Note that adult Twitter users are computer-literate, tech-savvy people over 18.  The supposed creme de la creme of our society, who “get it”.  Oh #*@(%@!

While I have at least a dozen longer posts I’m working on because of REBlogWorld and BlogWorld Expo, I thought I would do the popular “Top X Things I Learned from BlogWorld” deal as an advance peek.  But I’m finding it hard to be… I don’t know the term… earnest about it.  So if you want a real Top Ten list, I suggest heading over to Morgan Brown’s blog for his Top Ten Things I Learned at Blogworld.  It’s a great post; this one here… not so much.

My post is the Top Nine Things I Learned at BlogWorld, because I’m definitely less than Morgan in this regard, and because the last person in the world I want to emulate right now is David Letterman.

So here they are:

1. Real estate is way ahead of the curve of every other industry when it comes to social media, because it turns out that social people do better with social media.
2. Journalists have no idea where journalism is headed, because they don’t really know what the institutional competence of media is.  They’re not particularly interested in finding out.
3. Social media needs a House of Medici, a patron who will demand nothing in return except creativity and art, because most of these guys produce incredibly cool shit that will make absolutely no money.
4. BlogWorld is kinda like GenCon in terms of how friendly everyone is, except the attendees have fewer things in common.
5. Many social media professionals talk as if social media is the future of media, then act exactly the opposite when camera crews show up.
6. For a group preachin’ authenticity, there sure were a lot of people with all kinds of gimmicks, like dressing up as Vader, or puppets, or hugging strangers, or stage wigs.  Pretty sure that half the people I met weren’t people at all, but IRL avatars.
7. Niceness is absolutely the coin of the realm in blogworld.  Whuffie is for real, at least until you have to buy a sandwich.  Then it’s not.
8. Very few people in social media know how to dance.  I gather that nightclubs are not their native habitat. If you saw some dancing at one of the parties, chances are better than even that they were from the real estate world.
9. It is extremely easy to spend $800 on dinner for six in Las Vegas, and still be hungry as you walk out of the restaurant.

Most of this list will find its way into one or more longer posts in the future.  But there you have it.  Apparently, I learn all the wrong lessons by looking at all the wrong places….

-rsh

Holy Bloggers, Batman!

Greetings from Las Vegas — I’m not sure what time it is, even though I’ve been fully awake for, oh, a few hours.  But some of the discussions at REBlogWorld 2009 have been so great that I wanted to get something posted now.

One of the more interesting sessions for me personally was the Branding in the Social Age session with luminaries like Jeff Turner (@respres), David Armano (@armano), Todd Carpenter (@tcar), and Ian Lurie (@portentint), moderated by a luminary herself, Nicole Nicolay (@nik_nik).  I thought the insights were interesting, and the brainpower on that panel was impressive.

There was one point, however, which I suppose yours truly raised, that could use some elaboration and explication: multiple brand layers and how they function in social media.  I was genuinely curious what branding experts, especially those from outside our industry, like David and Ian, had to say about the issue — and I don’t know that they understood the issue.  Plus, the inimitable Bill Lublin (@billlublin) had his views on the matter, but I’m uncertain that he understood the context.  So the fault is mine for failing to set the stage adequately and explain precisely what I meant, and why I think this is an issue.

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So now that Benn Rosales of AgentGenius has jumped into the fray with his latest post, which comes on the heels of Jim Marks’s critique of my Inman column (subscribers only), I figure it might be good to consolidate my responses here.  And this is not to mention the various commenters on the Inman post, conversations via Twitter, email, etc.  This topic’s got folks fired up — in a good way.

Let me point out that the critiques come in three different flavors.

1. Social media is a great marketing platform!
2. Interaction on social media, including Twitter, is no different from offline networking.
3. Twitter is a great tool for building sphere of influence!

Let us go through each in order, then summarize with what I think is a larger lesson about marketing strategy.

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Get ready, NAR; there are gonna be some questions coming your way soon.

[UPDATE: The text of Standard of Practice 15-2 has been released. Please see below the fold.]

According to Ben Martin of the Virginia Association of REALTORS over at VARBuzz.com, NAR has released a new Code of Ethics:

Standard of Practice 15-2 was amended and a new Standard of Practice was approved to strengthen members’ obligations to refrain from making false or misleading statements about competitors, including in use of social media tools.

The new amendment includes the duty to publish a clarification about, or to remove statements made by, others on electronic media the REALTOR® controls once the REALTOR® knows the statement is false or misleading. For example, if you’re publishing a blog and someone posts a false or misleading comment about a fellow REALTOR® on it, it’s your duty to remove the post or publish a clarification when you become aware of it.

That was Ben quoting from a newsletter sent out by NAR to association executives, as the actual language of Standard of Practice 15-2 was not available.

Ben goes on to note a real concern:

As I understand it from this article on the Section 230 from the Electronic Freedom Foundation, the more Internet publishers take an active role in editing or publishing content posted by third parties, the more likely they are to open themselves up to legal liability.

Well, you should consult an actual lawyer for a real opinion if you’re concerned about this, but I have further questions from both a legal perspective and a social media perspective.

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Last night, I got into an interesting debate over Twitter with Ari Herzog among others over the topic of whether social media is MEDIA.  Because Twitter isn’t really the appropriate forum for laying out one’s arguments, I thought to transfer it here in hopes of advancing it some.  Or at least getting my thoughts down.

The Setup

It all started when Ari tweeted:

I casually responded:

@ariherzog ain’t social media… y’know… MEDIA? that there is a fundamental problem of modern journalism.

That launched a series of back-and-forths with others jumping in that was one of the more interesting Tweet-Debates I’ve had to date.

My basic point was that if major news sources embrace social media, then that basically puts the value proposition of journalism into jeopardy, because I view social media as a new form of media.  Why subscribe to a RSS feed from the LA Times when I can subscribe to RSS feeds from the people and organizations that the LA Times reporter spoke to to get his facts?

It turned out, Ari had a different definition of “Social Media”:

Well, can’t argue with that.  If he meant by “social media” stuff like people mashing up maps with data… okay, then journalism has no issues at all.

But what if he’s wrong?  What if “social media” isn’t just a stand-in for the undefined term “Web 2.0″?  What if it really is a new form of media — transfer of information from one party to another?

I thought it worthwhile to lay down my arguments on… er… “paper”.

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What do you mean these Fireside Chats aren't enough? Fireside Tweets is undignified man!

Back when Todd Carpenter was applying for the position of Social Media Manager at the National Association of REALTORS, I endorsed him with reservations. Those reservations had nothing to do with Todd, as he was (and is) perhaps the most qualified person to head up social media strategy for NAR.  When he got the position, I was extremely happy for him personally, but concerned about a few implications of what “going corporate” would mean for Todd and for NAR.  I wrote about those here, and made a couple of recommendations.

Fast forward to last week, when an absolute blogstorm erupted over the issue of NAR endorsement of a local MLS rule forcing members to block Google from indexing IDX listings on their websites.  Some of the responses of people on that thread were extraordinarily interesting from a social media strategy standpoint.  The substance of the issue in that post is addressed there and elsewhere.  The focus of this post is on the process of deploying social media strategies for large organizations, particularly when the organization brings in a well-known figure in the wider community.

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Benn Rosales (@agentgenius) is one of the smartest guys working in real estate and social media today, and as the proprietor (?? – maybe czar? emperor?) of AgentGenius, one of the best real-estate industry sites out there, he brings a great deal of credibility to everything he says.

A few months ago, he and I had a tremendously exciting and stimulating debate on the telephone about measuring ROI from social media.  I think we ended up disagreeing on some points, but the whole conversation was so enriching and so enlightening that I have been looking forward to the next chapter.

That next chapter has been opened:

I’ve had this conversation with many people over the past 6 months about tracking ROI and at the time, no study, nor documentation really existed, however, in recent months this all changed with Dell, when they bragged about their $1 Million in sales from Twitter.

Interestingly enough, it was done through channels with channel specific deals which leads me to Trulia, Zillow, and local MLS Boards, as well as FSBO, REO, and other property aggregates and large Brokers themselves as a means to move volume inventory.

Benn goes on to hypothesize that “real-estate channels” may be

the beginning of the answer to real estate and social media above and beyond the agent but allow the agent the opportunity to participate with their particular social spheres.

All in all an interesting opening, and one well-positioned to move the discussion forward.

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