Here, Here Mr. Toad. Excellent post. I believe you’ll find many experienced business professionals who agree with your assessment on the demographics of social media.

But your persona… While I love the alliteration of your name, I feel as though I’ve arrived at a business meeting and found someone at the table in a costume, calling attention to himself. I’m trying to peek under your warty mask and wondering why? You speak of "authenticity" on your blog...

To me, the mask conflicts with your wise commentary and feels, I have to tell you, a bit gimmicky.

Does your current agency disapprove of your posts? And what does that say about the value of blogging in your business?

Hey Toad,

Interesting post. As you know I'm right in the demo that you peg as folks whose social life comes front and center. However, in my opinion social networks (especially facebook) are methods of relationship management and simulated connectedness. Similar to the recent debates around Twitter, SNS give you an opportunity to log in once a day and check up on what's going on. Personally after graduating college my usage has dropped off and now I spend about 5 min a day on FB where I just scroll down the newsfeed and usually just logout. However, I still feel as if I am in the know and the best example of relationship management is the upper-right box on the FB homepage: The Birthday Box. It means a lot to people when you just leave them a short quip on their wall when their B-Day rolls around.

Seni

TT, in my opinion you could be right if talking about compulsory use of social network. But being compulsive is a problem watching TV, too.
We are indeed more exposed to an enlarged number of friends, some of them off line, some of them on line. But how changed our lifestyle in the last twenty years? I suppose that dramatic changes took place in the US as well as in many other countries in the world. Maybe, when the first email arrived on our desk, we thought that we would be in trouble for too many distraction from our job. And when mobile phone stepped in our life, we thought that we would have spent too many time at the phone and less time talking with our friends. Reality is that we have more friends, today, that make our life richier, if we use these tools in a savvy way.

Toad,

I often wonder about Social Media in the context of business person use. For me, Social Media has little to do with socializing, which happens after 5 p.m. Social Media for this business person is a place I visit between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. as part of my business networking efforts. It seems a great way to connect with business persons from around the world, with whom I might not otherwise be able to experience and share.

Does my behavior seem usual or unusual? Thanks for another thought-provoking post.

While I agree with much of what you say, there is an important element of social connection I think you’re missing. This element is what changes the way we marketers do business.

Yes, some people use social networking sites as excuses to not connect to those who are closest to them, like their families. However, social networking in both consumer and business enables the individual to connect to those who share similar interests. This is the real key to success in social networking and the reason businesses, and those of us who help businesses market, should care.

Consumers who share an interest in a sport or activity or hobby or celebrity now come together to share information with like-minded individuals. Now consumers can socialize with their loved ones and with the people who love the same things they do – which are often not the same.

Business consumers (users, buyers, decision-makers and decision-influencers) who share an interest in a product or service now come together to share information with like-minded individuals. Now business consumers have access to information that makes them smarter about the decisions they need to make.

Whether they are a consumer or a business consumer, they can socialize with the people that are closest to them AND they can now socialize with the people who have information and ideas that are of great interest to them, who are not closest to them.

They can now do both, and that’s what the revolution is all about.

Sounds too me like your saying that social networking is a "generational" thing. To which I say...respectfully, "duh".
Three years ago, I decided to learn the computer after a four year old at the library "logged me on" and wanted to know what a "card catalog" was.
The next generation *is* different than mine, and they are the future.
Never forget, when Elvis Presley came on the scene, alot of nervous parents consoled themselves, saying that rock and roll would just be another phase.
I believe that all of us need to stay in touch with the tactics of the following generation. Not only are they already geared to buy online, but they are the consumers who will be around when my generation is gone.

Okay, in order

@Gwyneth: http://bloombergmarketing.blogs.com/bloomberg_marketing/2007/09/whats-a-busines.html

@Seni: There are other ways to remember someone's birthday. I'm thinking in time you might find something more like LinkedIn to be more valuable. Because as I noted, the people you know through business aren't your friends as much as they are people you work with, and their birthdays aren't something you need to remember.

@Gianandrea: Yes, having friends makes our lives richer, it's just that there are various levels of involvemente we want to have with them.

@Lewis: That sounds exactly like the way I use LinkedIn. My point was that a business-oriented social networking site is going to look a lot different than a social life-oriented once, will demand a different level of involvement and as such will need to be treated differently by marketers.

@Glenn: Are you putting things like message boards and the like in the "social media" category? There are definitely blogs and message boards I visit to talk with other people about marketing and sports and the like, but again, those demand less involvement- they're a part of my life, not my whole life.

@Sue: Well "duh" back atcha;) You seem to have missed the entire point of the post, which was that DIFFERENT TYPES OF SOCIAL MEDIA will appeal to different age groups and that we need to realize that the Facebook/MySpace model is just one valid model of the many that will crop up to meet our constantly shifting needs.

Great nuance here, Social Networks sites often give us ways to be social that we have not had in the past. It's not about the tools, but about who and how we connect. Linkedin is a great example. Really good post!

It's a matter of opinion which of the classes you mention lacks an interesting social life. Personally I'd take a social life with adults over one with children anytime (unless you find kids soccer, piano lessons and school particularly fascinating or stimulating).

Most parents of my acquaintance are either desperate for intellectual stimulation or have just given up.

Hey, I'm *internet* famous...I'm the guy who posted the comment about
ignoring the dumbass on the couch.

And, for the record, I was the dumbass in that scenario...not my very-real-not-imagined wife and kids.

First off, TT, congrats on all the new reach you're getting. It's cool to see you spreading some interesting conversation beyond your blog. Now, onto my beef...

My point in the original post was that social networking was, indeed, social.

My new point would be that you confuse "social networking", as a term, with "communicating with friends." My definition is more like "communicating with people I have a reason to communicate with (whether social or business or whatever)."

Further, you say "social networking doesn’t work for a large portion of the population because if we’re socializing online, we’re being anti-social offline." That only holds true if your online persona is fundamentally separate from your meat-space persona (example, if you use one name to collect a paycheck and a different, perhaps alliterative reptilian name to write a blog). But if you are using online tools to coordinate offline meet-ups, and essentially using them to organize your life as a whole, well...that feels pretty darn social to me.

I would also argue, naively in your eyes, that social networking sites ARE going to be the new way you use the interwebs. Like it or not, you're going to use social networking sites to help filter the content and steady stream of info the com-pu-tor will throw at you.

To encapsulate my takeaway...
TT thinks of Facebook (and similar sites) as "sites." And there ain't much potential in sites.

I think of Facebook (and similar sites) as browsers. And browsers matter.

Look at me, evolvin' a point of view.

Thazzit.

Toads are amphibians, not reptiles.

And at the risk of repeating myself, I'm not saying that there's no need for social networks.
Far from it.
Just that the all-encompassing Facebook/Twitter/MySpace model is not for everyone and that other demographics will prefer other less-involved models.

You also don't seem to grasp the notion that work contacts and social friends demand different levels of intimacy. And that "naive" refers not to you, young Bender, but to people who'd have us believe that the whole nation will be on a Facebook-type networking site within a decade. Again, different demographics will demand different levels of involvement from a social media provider.

Someone who provides a single solution that allows for those sort of shifts will become very rich indeed.

@Sue - Not sure you can say all social media is strictly generational. Unless I'm missing the point there, but the implication being that nobody 'old' uses it? Hmmm. Dunno.

There are enough choices out there for people to hang out at that they'll cherry pick what works best for them.

Consider too, that this generation of 25 and under grew up ONLY knowing the internet. Boomers knew a time before and after, so we may be getting into apples and oranges territory. Still, boomers aren't like the parents of the 50s. Half the people playing video games now are over 50. The boomer generation is Steve Jobs, so they definitely have an understanding of the space.

For me though, email is still the one true private social network I use, followed by IMing. It's one to one with someone in both cases sure, but who said social has to be more than two people?

;-p

@ bender - I think though that people will gravitate to the platform/way of doing things that suits them. (For me, I can say now I willl NEVER use Facebook or MySpace as way to get my info, not with the ton of spam and ads they have. (Although, I do appreciate the friend invites from the strippers there.)

I use a reader to scan all the sites I need. Got my excite home page and I'm good to go. It's not that I'm an old internet dog who can't learn new tricks–I just don't need to. My set-up works fine.

There comes a point, I know it's here for me, where I just can't keep track of all the latest social media Web 3.9 sites popping up every hour. And I watched a lot of them closely and it wasn't like they were original. Each one let you post your favs, tunes, friends list, blog, blah, blah.

But SO many of those sites are trying to position themselves as the next 'big thing' for their IPO rather than creating a true, intuitive internet experience. They spend so much time creting things and forcing you to learn THEIR way of navigating their site that they've disrupted what should be an intuitive experience for users.

Take two popular sites like Flickr or delicio.us that still have key features that only work on certain platforms, or that make you go through 15 steps to do what should take three.

Where ae the thought leaders when it comes to this issue though? Too busy on Amazon checking their sales or developing blogger's rights manifestos that lack real insight.

Maybe that's why Google may be the perfect social media site: it does one thing. Finds stuff. It does it almost perfectly. It connects you with others. Quickly.

There's so many of these that we haven't had time to play with the ones already there. I liken it to Christmas morning, where a kid moves on to the next gift before he's done unwrapping the first.

Let's play with last year's toys more instead of asking for next year's now.

@Toad: I see your point that one SN (social networking) site can't be all things to all people...today. But I do believe that the time's not far off--12 mos? 24? Pure conjecture, but I believe it.

P.S....amphibian!?! I feel like an idiot. That's what I get for Commenting Under the Influence.

@bg: Your setup works fine today, but what happens when 99.9% of your work and social contacts are using that to communicate? Not saying you have to out-Twitter with every new SN toy, just saying it's a shift that's happening regardless of whether you participate or not.

Again, it's just my GO (Guts & opinions") belief that this'll happen in 12-24 months. Can't prove it, can't disprove it.

But I'd bet dollars to doughnuts it'll happen fer sure within 5 years.

Thazzit.

@All: I am not paying Bender to be the perfect foil, nor have I paid him to include phrases like "Thazzit" and "fer sure."

@Bender: When you are sober, perhaps you can explain *why* Facebook will supplant Google within a year, a claim even the most fanatical Googler would have trouble making with a straight face.

@BG: Excellent argument all around, especially the part about new sites being like discarded Christmas presents.

As I said earlier, the killer app may well be one that allows you to have different levels of intimacy with different people, so that your boss only sees the work-related you, while your friends see the fun-loving you. Will people want to combine both sides of themselves on one site? Not sure they will.

@ bender - It may be a shift that happens regardless, but don't we gravitate towards the familar in terms of how we communicate? My daughter has no problem running five things at once, surfing, IMing, texting, TV, etc. I prefer to do maybe two of those at once. It's because of this that I get a little crazy when the internet gadget gurus push a new app you just have to try every day it seems. Why? To be an ealry 'adopter'?

Each generation will also retain its preferred method of communicating. I don't mean my grandmother used a rotary phone and my daughter texts on a cell. I mean the way we view the act of conversation. For boomers+, conversation seemed to be more special, personal and private. Today, 16-year olds tell the world their story on MySpace to any loser that will watch.

My daughter also bypasses email in favor of texting as the number one method of talking with friends where I prefer email.

Then there's the false public conversations on Twitter.

Let's face it, while Twitter is a global 24/7 IM app, is any real conversation going on? It's people talking politely about their To Do list of a day, (I'm going to the bathroom!, I’m walking to my car!, etc.) or it's poet-writer wannabes trying to show how clever they can be in 140 characters or less. It's no less revealing than the person you just met at a party.

Craigslist conversation threads are far more revealing even though it's decidely far lower tech.

I think the point of this blog is that social networking is not going to be the be-all and end-all that some think it will, and I agree wholeheartedly.

While the hypesters breathlessly proclaim that social networking is the future of internet, this blog has great points that no, they will not be the one and only future of the internet.

Those who put all their eggs in social networking will likely feel the pain when the bubble bursts and a new reality emerges, where social networking is just another tool on the internet that will be used to various degrees. Age demographics will undoubtedly be a strong factor in determining the use of social networking.

There will a shake-out and a lot of these new tools will fade away, and a small number of well crafted social networking sites will dominate.

@Toad...you owe me 20 bucks. For an extra 10, I'll mention "web 3.0" in my next post.

Should I throw in a few emoticons next?

Thazz...(ahem) that's all for now, sir.

Great, you got my point as well.

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=197205816&blogID=271513556

I can make like few hundreds of examples of business clients that actually don't need social media, blogs or any other stuff to make their business.

But if you live in NYC or LA or in some other big city, socializing over internet seems "normal". That's the only problem of modern view over this phenomenon.

I agree on some accounts but on others, such as it not working for a large portion of the population- It widely depends on what in particular you are using. This is especially the case when it comes in the form of leading up to being anti-social offline.

Twitter, for example, is in actually improving offline communication by keeping others up to date. By beginning a life stream and tweeting a particular message, you may create an unintentional result of a friend calling you about something you tweeted (or perhaps e-mailing, leading to a phone call). In this case, it would seem twitter is enhancing offline social environments as opposed to inhibiting them.

Is twitter a special case? Maybe. But like I said in the beginning of the comment, I think it widely depends on the network.