Is social media a fad ?

05/11/10 06:05 AM Filed in: Social Media

"Is Social Media a fad or the biggest shift since the industrial revolution?" asks this new video based on Erik Qualman's book Socialnomics. It's hard to read any business publication or surf the Internet without reading a new story about Facebook or Twitter but then not too long ago we were reading how eBay and AOL were going to rule the Internet. Ultimately consumers will determine who wins but it's also important to separate the hype from reality when it comes to social media.

Facebook rules the Web. Twitter is growing rapidly. Foursquare is going to be the next hot social media platform. Bullshit ! The reality is that nobody knows who is going to rule the Web and what users will crown as the next online success.

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Facebook likes to talk about the 400 million + users they have but when you look at the behavior of these users we still find that a lot of people are only occasional Facebook users don't go to their Facebook pages everyday. One thing we learn about consumers is that they can tire very quickly of new Internet trends before moving onto the next one. I really don't believe that Facebook is a fad but I do believe that in 3-5 years we will be talking about Facebook a lot less than we are now. Here's why;

-Consumers love to be connected 24/7/365 but I believe there is going to come a time when they are going to grow tired of being connected all the time. I mean over 25% of people say it's OK to text during sex ? OK, if they can text during sex then they are doing something wrong and missing a lot.

-Interpersonal communication via social media is leading to an erosion of personal communications skills. To really exchange ideas you need to convey emotion and really understand what the other person is saying. People are eventually going to find out how rewarding it can be to actually talk with someone face to face.

-Big brother syndrome. No I don't want to share where I have been on the Web with my Facebook friends and I don't want my employer and coworkers to know that practice zen yoga and I am a nudist on weekends.

-You don't friend me, I won't friend you. So you said something to someone about me behind my back ha? Well I'll show you I'll de-friend you from Facebook.

-Why are marketers following me on social media now? I just wanted to make a comment about my new car and before I knew it I had marketers trying to sell me more stuff. What's up with that?

Social media may indeed be with us for a long long while but please don't buy the ranch that says it's going to rule the Web and control our lives. If anyone could predict where consumers would go and what they would do they would be rich right now.

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Tags: Fad vs. Reality