Yesterday I had a great breakfast with David Jacobs. David is one of the original Social Media guys, who I met through the Orange County Podcasters. Two things that I like about David. He’s a “gray hair” just like me, and in his own words, “I’ve never met a technology that I wasn’t willing to try — at least once.” David is my early alert alert system to what the cool kids are playing with lately.
We were discussing the hurdles that any New Media Evangelist must overcome to convince the Traditionals to adopt new ways of communicating with customers. We talked about the fact that the Traditionals don’t see the value of a blogger, who can say anything that he/she wants, compared with the carefully chosen message that the Marketing Department has carved into Carrera marble. That’s when David added some serendipitous insight.
“Because Marketing people are trained to tell ‘Their Deal.’ Bloggers tell, ‘The Deal.’”
Brilliant.
The Traditionals have their own agenda. They have a message — their message — and will use it as a club to beat their customers over the head with until they succumb. The corporate message has nothing to do with credibility or truth, and yet everything to do about the sanctity of their carefully staged illusion.
Corporate bloggers, on the other hand, have a different agenda. They must maintain their credibility at all costs, even if it means telling the truth, and potentially casting a product or service in a somewhat less-than-perfect light. Marketing and sales people HATE this.
In David’s words, corporate bloggers need to remember to write about “The Deal” — the one their customers care about. The one that will help them use a product or service to provide the best customer-results possible. In the long run, “The Deal” is much more important than “Their Deal.”
