Much to my mother’s dismay I took woodshop instead of home economics in middle school. Partly because I knew I couldn’t cook, but mostly in the hope woodworking could unleash my artistic capabilities. Sadly, I was wrong. What I did learn is the importance of the various tools and using the right one for the right project. Social media is much like the wood lathe. You can’t just walk up to it and create beautiful pieces. However, with training and practice you can create good work. Once you understand the equipment and have some training you can create something useful and sometimes beautiful, but there are only a few masters in the space. (Some of my handiwork still has a place of honor at grandma’s house!) 

Google Image: Wood Carving Guide

The BurrellesLuce booth is in a great location for traffic and for feedback, here at the 2009 PRSA International Conference, so we are hearing a lot of buzz after each session. Attendees want to hear directly from @scottmonty and @southwestair rather than merely opinions about their programs without the granular measurements to really show effectiveness. So, to all the social media guru’s yet to present at the PRSA International Conference beware. The 2009 conference is like most other industry events this year: social media is dominating the conversation. The difference is most public relations pros in attendance, who have stakeholders in social media, are already active in the social media arena. Thus, you really need to have some insights and applications to satisfy the audience.

I’ve often equated social media to the fax machine. It’s a tool and another medium for communication. I never attended a fax machine conference, yet I still figured out how to integrate the fax into my overall communication strategy. The same now goes for social media – we are all in the trenches together and real world application with tales of success and failure are most valued. The attendees at the PRSA conference are savvy and not buying candlesticks from junior high woodworkers. They are looking for master insight. If you are declaring yourself an expert or guru, you better be able to back it up.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 9th, 2009 at 4:04 pm and is filed under Industry Events, Public Relations, Social Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.