Ahmadinejad Can't Stop a Twitter Revolution

On the eve of the recent and corrupt Iranian election, the government cut off all mobile and internet connections to the outside world. But, they made a huge mistake by underestimating The People's desire for change. Hope is alive in the streets of Tehran, and Twitter helped broadcast it.

The video above shows the inspiring protest and support of opposition leader, Moussavi. As The Daily Dish reported, a tweet from one of his supporters urged protesters to shout from the rooftops. It's incredible to watch.

There was also a fantastic example of Twitter being used as a media watchdog in the election coverage (via Mashable), as users accused CNN of burying the story. The hastag #CNNfail was used and, since its trending peak on Sunday, CNN has increased their coverage.

For our currently out-of-work marketing comrades...it sounds like Ahmadinejad will soon be needing a new Communications Director. Just don't tweet your resume.

Twitter - Cut the Courtesy

There was an interesting online debate yesterday about whether or not to use autofollow. For those who don't know what it is, autofollow is a tool offered by services like TweetLater that automatically follow back people who follow you. The debate centered around whether or not using this tool is a social courtesy.

It seems to me that at its core, Twitter is entirely based on gain. And I don’t like to fool myself and pretend that it exists under a social umbrella of sincerity. The gain benefits everyday people, personal brands, business brands, government, public services, etc. And it's defined by increasing friendships, establishing thought leadership, cultivating brand ambassadors, increasing revenue, tapping information (education and news outlets), etc.

Please understand that I'm not using the word "gain" in a negative sense. I'm using it as Descartes or Kant would have in that we are all first and foremost ego-driven. We may talk about Twitter as "joining the conversation" (or other touchy-feely social phrases), but the reality is that we all have something to gain from it. AND THAT'S FINE.

Personally, I feel autofollowing is less a courtesy and more about racking-up numbers. Increasing the people you follow is one of ways to build followers because it more deeply embeds you into the Twitter community. Some people believe that you should have close to the same number of followers as people you're following. It's spoken about as some arbitrary Twitter cred.
Who cares? Why worry about other people's motivations or numbers? I digress.

"Courtesy" to me is participation - responding to your blog's comments, answering peoples' questions on Twitter and sharing your bookmarks (knowledge), for example. Helping one another. But by banking thousands of people in your Twitter account, your availability for intimacy is obviously diluted.

For the record, I used autofollow as I was learning about Twitter – and I paid for it in tons of spammy tweets. Thank goodness for Seesmic and Tweetdeck that allow us to filter out the noise we created and bring us back to the core value of the service...however you define it.

Build a Social Story

I was reading a great piece this morning by Dave Armano entitled “Kill Your Website.” He writes about how his blog has become a much more valuable (and cheaper) tool in connecting with his audience. So, he shut his website down.

It’s important to keep in mind that Dave is a well-respected leader in the design world, and his audience is highly interactive. So, a blog is the perfect platform for his communication channel. But it's obviously not necessarily right for every brand.

It made me think of how many of the small to midsized businesses that we work with don’t have the same audience engagement level as a personal brand like Dave or a passion-crazed company like Apple. But that’s okay. The important thing is that we evaluate our brand’s aptitude and commitment level to the “conversation,” as well as their customers’ social behavior. That way, we can make grounded recommendations. Too often I’ve seen agencies suggest building social communities or high commitment platforms without any research or foresight. Sure, gut instincts are still important. But with all the research that’s easily available, it’s not solely the responsible approach.

As a strategically-grounded shop, we try to educate our clients on focusing on plans not platforms or tools. Engagement not websites. Interaction not blogs. Communication not Twitter. Community not Facebook. We try to steer them away from getting caught-up in all of “the latest and greatest” social media whiz-bang and focus on their Social Story as a whole. It starts by defining goals and then figuring out the best way to facilitate the relationship with their customers.

Re-evaluating My Ratio

With so many new social platforms/tools released everyday, it’s becoming a full-time job to try to keep up with them. But, it's my job to maintain a keen eye on how the communication landscape is changing. Matt Williams, Group Planning Director at The Martin Agency, and I were having lunch a while back, and he had a great line: “My job is keeping me from doing my job”.

We do have an obligation to understand the shifts and growths in the media landscape, but at what sacrifice? It’s important to have discipline. I could literally spend all day, everyday reading about social media because there is so much chatter and coverage. But I don’t.

As a strategist, I can’t afford to sacrifice the “why” for the “how”. In other words, I have to find a balance between education and motivation in these explosive times.

I recently realized that I was feeling as if I had to read every blog post, tweet, Facebook update, etc. to “stay on top of it.” My head was about to explode. I was anxious. And, I was experiencing a certain information paralysis.

So, I've cranked up Seesmic for Twitter and Facebook, cut my Google Reader subscriptions to 20, started using IM more and encouraged people to call me to cut back on emails - and generally tried to cut back on my information in-take.

For someone who loves to read and discover all of these fascinating, new tools that are empowering people and brands to extend and focus at the same time, it's hard to step back a bit.

I'll let you know how this works out...