OH BEHAVE! SOCIAL MEDIA ETIQUETTE

Most of us have various different social personas that we adopt throughout our lives. It’s something we do instinctively. For instance, we wouldn’t tell the latest pub joke while enjoying tea with an elderly aunt, and we wouldn’t start talking serious shop while on a stag do. So how come these roles that we adopt so fluidly in the real world are things that we blithely ignore in the virtual universe?

I find it amazing that people seem to just click ‘send’ and blanket-share their thoughts across several social media platforms instantly.

When I go to Linkedin, I am entering it in a professional frame of mind, looking to make useful new connections or learn some interesting things about what’s happening in the field of marketing and communications. It’s not the place where I want to receive updates about people’s hangovers or posts about how their constipation has flared up again.

Similarly, when I go onto Twitter, I go on it to find interesting new things – new films, new ideas, new and interesting ways people have found to get under people’s radar. I don’t particularly want personal updates from people who I barely know and are just sitting in an office somewhere. Sure, if I’m following Katy Perry or Russell Brand I might expect those kind of posts – they’re celebrities, we know who they are, we understand their personal predilections, we can share in the joke. But Stephen Fry sharing an amusing observation isn’t the same as some worker drone venting their frustration at the office photocopier.

Facebook, on the other hand, is the Las Vegas of social media – where the most outrageous and silly stuff can have a natural home and we can smile knowingly at it, without judgement or condemnation. What happens on Facebook, stays on Facebook.

However, to me, someone posting Facebook-style updates on Linkedin is like someone turning up to an important business meeting wearing stained leisure pants, sucking on a doobie.

A lot of the people I’m connected to socially work in advertising/marketing.

As professionals, we’d never allow our clients to display inappropriate messages in the wrong channels. So why do we do let ourselves do it?

So, to sum up, here’s my handy guide to Social Media etiquette:

TWITTER

APPROPRIATE:

Pfizer find interesting new app to market Viagra (link)

INAPPROPRIATE:

Took a Viagra and sure put a killing on my old lady last night LOL!!!

LINKEDIN

APPROPRIATE:

Does anyone know of any job opportunities for Senior Writers in the Bristol area?

INAPPROPRIATE:

Am well bored at work, considered stabbing myself with a pencil to stay awake : (

FACEBOOK

APPROPRIATE:

3 beers, 3 cocktails, 2 pills last night. Absolutely monged!!

INAPPROPRIATE:

Diageo in £3m Direct Marketing push, read more…

THE SOCIAL REVOLUTION WILL BE TELEVISED

It’s funny how significant even the most glib media-coined words and phrases can turn out to be.

All the talk of the Social Media “revolution” over the last few years appears powerfully prophetic in the light of the role that social media has played in the unrest and regime change that has dominated the news recently.

When the Egyptian and Tunisian governments are actively blocking access to Facebook and Twitter, it’s obvious that they’ve become far more powerful weapons than baseball bats and the odd artfully lobbed rocks ever were.

And when even “sleepy London town” (as Mick Jagger once referred to it) is inspired to embrace the Parisian student spirit of ’68 to protest against rising fees, you realise how seismically social media has shifted both personal and political action.

But what is it that has turned places where you once merely put up silly photos from the Christmas party and links to funny videos, into entities that have governments quaking in their military boots?

I’d argue that a principal reason is that they’ve brought back a sense of connectedness and collective identity. We know that the old-fashioned concept of community is a thing of the past and the Union’s power has been battered and eroded over the years. But the advent of social media seems to have allowed people a chance to re-discover a sense that “we’re all in it together” and reminded us that when we choose to exercise our collective will, it’s a mightily potent force.

And when status updates go from “feeling bored : )” to “just brought down a government”, it’s about time we all started taking a bit more care in how we utilise this digital revolutionary that’s sat on our desks, patiently waiting to change the world.

A PERFECT (BRAIN)STORM

On paper the concept of ‘brainstorming’ sounds profoundly sexy – reminiscent of over-running the Winter Palace of your consciousness and firing off on all synapses like a crack rifle squad.

The reality? All too often, it comes down to a put-upon Account person attempting to decipher a couple of pages worth of tatty flipchart paper filled with inane ramblings.

So in an attempt to avoid the latter depressing scenario, here are my top 10 tips for better brainstorms.

1) CALL IT AT THE RIGHT POINT. Better to wait ‘til you have an inkling of which direction you want to go rather than have an open-ended free-for-all based around a vague understanding of a client’s business.

2) INVITE A SELECT BUNCH OF PEOPLE. This will serve to make everyone present feel they have a responsibility to contribute to the session. It will also make those who weren’t invited more curious about what went on and more eager to participate in the next brainstorm.

3) STATE A TIME FOR THE SESSION. Make this no longer than 20-25 minutes.

4) SET AN ALARM CLOCK IN THE SESSION. If people know a bell is going to go off when the time’s up they can relax knowing that the meeting won’t drag on and suck their time into a black hole. (N.B. make sure you end the session when the clock goes off.)

5) SET OUT THE BRIEF IN NO MORE THAN 2 MINUTES. You don’t want them to know every nook and cranny of the business problem, just enough to get them started. I’ve been in brainstorms where the briefing took so long I’ve forgotten what I was there for by the end of it.

6) MAKE YOUR CREATIVE OPENER CREATIVE. If you want to get the creative juices flowing, start with a genuine brain-teaser like “how would you feel about shopping if brands didn’t exist?” rather than some bland stunner like “how do you feel about shopping in general?”

7) HAVE A LONG LIST OF QUESTIONS. You need a constant source of stimulus to keep the ideas flowing and new thoughts to lob in when the energy gets low. Think of it as having to keep people’s brains spritzed throughout.

8) ENGAGE THE WHOLE GROUP. If anyone isn’t contributing, draw them in - they might have something amazing to say that they are a bit shy about sharing.

9) DON’T JUDGE. Don’t say “any idea is a good idea” and then start editing the thoughts in the session.

10) SHARE THE NOTES. Make sure the brainstorm notes are distributed to all the invitees, highlighting any particularly interesting ideas or thoughts that have the potential to go further. This will make people feel as though they haven’t wasted their time.

So, there it is. Now, here’s to future of brainstorms. Here’s to buzzy, engaged sessions not looming, time-eating events on the computer calendar.