The Earth Is Moving and So Is Social Media
If you saw a few cars smashed by falling bricks yesterday, chances are you were looking at a courtyard out the back window of the SIPA main office in Vienna, Va. We are about 100 miles from the epicenter of yesterday’s earthquake, so our second-floor office trembled for a good 30 seconds while books, clocks and plants fell off the shelves.
It was a scary few moments, but everyone is okay. The earthquake provided another test for social media and the role it now plays in our society. Looking at my Facebook pages this morning—especially in the wake of their privacy changes announced yesterday—makes me think at least twice about what its best uses are. And which of those are marketing related?
You can tell everyone you’re safe—always a good thing. You can tell everyone where you are—sometimes a good thing. One friend is visiting South Africa, another Montana and the rest thought they needed to say where they were during the earthquake and where they are now (either in traffic, at early happy hour or home). You can share something “funny.” Someone forwarded Carole King singing “I Feel the Earth Move (Under My Feet)” on YouTube. Another put up a multiple choice question asking the first thing you did after the quake hit (“b” was “go to Facebook”). As for media entities, the Washington City Paper had an immediate post up titled “Yes, that was an earthquake” and followed with good reporting on damage at the National Cathedral and statements from Washington, D.C., Police Chief Cathy Lanier. Of course, the paper also included, “The Best And Worst Earthquake Jokes” and a “Post-Tremor Restaurant Roundup” asking “How bout some fries with that shake?”
What we’re really getting back to here is David Meerman Scott’s real-time marketing and pr, the concept that what you do now to react to an event is far more important than planning for two months out. With that as a guide, he might say that quickly putting out a Cyber-security manual or an investment webinar about how to deal with natural disasters might be the way to go—rather than that newsletter that you’ve been preparing on the end of summer.
Also of importance is to know your specific social media. LinkedIn carries a more serious tone so you wouldn’t be playing around or punning much there. Twitter is short so you’re basically making a quick point or pointing something out. Facebook is tricky. Some people post their every move and I pretty much ignore them now. So yes, you can have fun with it, but you probably don’t want to overstay your welcome.
As for yesterday’s privacy changes, the New York Times reports that “every time Facebook users [now] add a picture, comment or any other content to their profile pages, they can specify who can see it: all of their so-called Facebook friends, a specific group of friends, or everyone who has access to the Internet. These will be indicated by icons that replace the current, more complicated padlock menu.”
Similar controls will appear for users’ phone numbers, hometowns and certain “likes” on your profile page—no more “separate privacy page to tweak who sees how much of that personal information. Nor will they have to bother to remember what those settings were.” And as for the tagging that I wrote about last week—something Europeans in particular seem to object to—no photograph will appear on your profile page without your consent. (It can still appear on the page of the person who took it, however.) Lastly, the privacy option has changed from “everyone” to “public.” There might have been some confusion that “everyone” meant all your friends.
Here’s to having a regular old day today.
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