By Tricia Farwell
Assistant Professor, Middle Tennessee State University

Walk into any classroom with computer access, WiFi access or cellular phone service and you will, most likely, find at least one student on Facebook, MySpace or YouTube. The students will tell you how they “get” social networking sites. Put up a few (usually less than sober) pictures. Post a few status updates ranging from song lyrics to what they did last night. Et voila! You have instant social media expertise through user experience without training.

However, some industry professionals appear to be less confident about their use and understanding of social media; they are still trying to discover the most meaningful way to incorporate it into their profession. Slips such as the infamous Memphis Twitter post by a Ketchum Vice President have shown organizations how a misstep can be a public relations disaster. In this case, the employee posted to his Twitter feed while waiting to meet with the client (FedEx). The post (http://shankman.com/wp-content/uploads//keyinfluencertweet.jpg) read: “True confession but I’m in one of those towns where I scratch my head and say ‘I would die if I had to live here!’” Understandably, FedEx employees were upset and the Ketchum employee experienced how public social networking can be.

While these social networking may not change the messages that the organizations intend to deliver to the public, the tools are impacting the way the messages are delivered. Century 21, for example transferred its national television advertising budget to focus on online media (Bush). The switch provided the company a way to open the lines of communication with publics by using vehicles most often thought to be, if not free at least inexpensive (Johnson). [Read more...]