Is Social Media Really all that Social?

April 23, 2009

On a daily basis I spend quite a bit of time on the internet looking for time saving ways to automate social media tasks. This made me realise that what once started as a way to connect with new people while keeping in touch with friends and family – has now turned into one of the biggest marketing engines that exist today.

With so much effort going into social media, there are literally hundreds of software programs and other online tools which allow you to automate the entire process. After a recent Twitter follow, I had a message come back to me saying “I really like you so much and decided to follow you” – now, I know for a fact that the person has probably never even looked at my profile – and as for liking me so much, I doubt that that person was even aware that they were now following me… but it’s all part of playing the social media game.

So, of course, I’m not knocking it. I love being a social media assistant and discovering new ways of developing business through this new craze, and from my perspective, there really is no other job I would rather do, but I also find it a bit sad that it has lost its true meaning – so to speak. We are all like little robots trying to promote ourselves and our businesses via a channel which was initially designed to be very personal.

Through microblogging, we can also keep each other updated on where we are. The average internet marketer will advise that you update your twitter account or other microblogging account around 10 times a day. So during the work day you can keep churning out “Tweets”, saying that you are in the office, at home, or even on the loo if you want to go that far (Twitter works on your mobile too). But in the grand scheme of things, have you ever actually read all of the tweets from the people you are following? It’s basically just a numbers game – if you have 20,000 people you’re following, and they all post 10 tweets a day – wouldn’t reading your Twitter account alone turn into more than a full time job?

We basically post a link to all those followers in the hope that a small percentage will click our link – this can lead to new traffic, hits, potential affiliate sales, and maybe even a comment on your blog post – but the simple fact is, we do it because it works and we can generate money from our followers. So, is social media really all that social?

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Posted by Virtual Miss Friday | Filed Under **Blogs**, **Business**, **Internet**, **Marketing**, **Media**, **Motivate**, **VMF**, **eBusiness**, Advertising, Development, Promotion