In interviews for his latest book his latest book, “The Thank You Economy”, Gary Vaynerchuk was quoted as saying that 99.5% of the people that walk around and say they are a social media expert or guru are clowns. Ive thinking about that in context of some interesting data released this past week. Seems the bloom is off the rose at Facebook and both US and Canadian users have decreased as a general trend over the past month. I take perverse pride in knowing Canadians lead the way here just as we led it the rate of adoption per capita, now we lead the withdrawal in real numbers.
But I digress.
And in the context of both Treys post about who do you trust and some writing I did a while ago about experts, even the kinds of questions you ask garden coaches, I bring you a simple way of evaluating a social media guru.
Understand we all sell something in my case, I’m selling ebooks, ad space and seminars. Nurseries are selling plants and you can figure out the most important thing what you are selling.
Ask the social media expert what theyve sold using social media themselves. Ask them the real numbers and outcomes not the activities.
Youre hiring a consultant because theyre supposed to know what theyre doing in the real world, not just knowing how to build a Facebook page or write something in 140 characters.
It would likely be my question about bloggers you hire as well. Are they simply well known as bloggers or can they drive business to your retail store?
Youre hiring social marketing expertise with the emphasis on marketing of your products be they words or hard goods. If you just need to know how to set up a Facebook page that’s one thing. If you need to know what attitude to bring, that’s another (you’ve got that done in an hour)
And if you’re hiring somebody to do it for you then you might want to evaluate that cost relative to the sales it generates. (99.5% of social media consultants might tell you differently)
My .02 is if they havent used it successfully in the real world but are only good at selling their consulting, then they fit Garys definition. Its the old line, BS baffles brains
p.s. I bought Garys recent book the Thank You Economy. Interesting but read his blog, its all there.
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