Why are there so many businesses now running toward social media?

There are indeed many businesses now running towards social media; however, I don?t think many of them are doing it smartly. I give a lot of credit to the firms and companies who are willing to take the plunge. I am lucky because I made all of my mistakes while working for boutique firms and clients ? when you make mistakes they never get close to the front page of the New York Times.

Getting on board with Edelman’s Online Advocacy team made me appreciate what this process must be like for companies that are always under the public scrutiny: Edelman, Microsoft, Nikon, and all the usual suspects. Frankly, it’s tough to be them. Anything they do, they’re in AdAge or the Times or the Journal. As a result, there isn’t a lot of room for innovation – they tend to be fearful and conservative in their campaigns, and that?s understandable.

Lots of people mocked Edelman’s Me2Revolution and Microsoft’s blogger outreach campaign that delivered Acer Ferrari laptops to bloggers to review Vista. I have to hand it to Edelman and its clients for even trying — for having at least some guts, and some willingness to be innovative.

The pity of such spectacular failures by the big boys is that their grand front-page mistakes scare smaller firms and much smaller clients away from gutsy innovation for fear that they too might end up with egg on their face. Frankly, most B-, C-, and D-list would benefit from making some seriously embarrassing, out-there, dumb-ass mistakes. I mean, come on! Social Media requires zits and all – it requires taking off the damn Gucci loafers and Savile Row suit for a while, rolling up your sleeves, and wading into the muck like a real person.

I remember comments made on Twitter asking Steve Rubel, Phil Gomes, and Rick Murray what they were doing wasting all their time on Twitter. Well, to be honest, Steve, Phil, and Rick are the only A-list PR executives who have any cred at all in the Blogosphere; they’re the only A-list bloggers that can pin their success to the real A-list and not the marketing and PR A-list over at the Power 150.

It is essential that businesses stop using Social Media as a toolset or gimmick. Social Media isn’t a panacea. It isn’t autoblogging, it isn’t splogging, and it isn’t astroturfing. Whatever it is, it doesn’t fit very well into the traditional 15-minute billing increments and it shouldn’t be become a bad word, either, like billing to admin is.

So, social media won’t work unless you invest, as I said. But what does it need? Well, it needs a lot of respect and it needs a lot of time and needs lots of gifts. No longer can the customer be raised like chattel.

Yeah, yeah, you say, not more of that — but sorry, as much as you might wish you could stay in the customers-on-a-leash modus of the 1980’s, things are no longer that way. Just like late-90s Silicon Valley, where you never knew who the millionaires were, you never know who the influencers are when you’re online. You have to be inside and active to figure that out. I can’t swing a cat (I swing as many cats as possible — I hate cats) without hitting a high-influencer in my social network on LinkedIn, Plaxo, FaceBook, Tumblr, Pownce, Jott, MySpace & Friendster (just joking), VOX, Jaiku, and Twitter.

The only reason anyone knows who I am is not because I have been online since 1983 or because I am able to hack code or maintain a Linux server or even because I am a geek. The reason why Doc Searls, Dave Winer, Chris Pirillo, and Robert Scoble know me from Adam is because I put myself out there. Because I have maintained a controversial blog since 1999, because I put myself out there and am willing to make an ass out myself, because I engage in the conversational spew, and because I am more than happy to call in to flash Tweet-up and invest in this crazy community of people, all of whom I know and love, most of whom I have never met. Social media isn’t simply a strategy, it is a culture, it has a protocol, it has its own language.

I am a native speaker of this language. Even if you can’t become a native speaker, you can become a naturalized citizen. In order to convert from old media to new media, you’re going to have to commit, you’re going to have to expatriate. You can practice all you want, but what is the point of learning the culture, the language, and the people if you’re not willing to settle in and join in?

And if you’re unwilling to take the leap, you had better hire a guide, hire a native speaker, or employ a native. That’s what Edelman does. It helps and it works. Of course, you can always hire me.

Geoff Livingston interviewed me on his blog, The Buzz Bin, this morning, A Social Media Conversation with Chris Abraham. Please check it out and add The Buzz Bin to your feeds. Thanks so much, Geoff!

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