To plug or not to plug, was my post, 2 weeks back.
And, here’s Ray Wert’s raging post on how Ford’s Scott Monty ‘uses’ his social media expert status oh-so-blatantly, to promote Ford in Twitter, among other places. The specific instance which seemed to have really annoyed Ray seems to be Scott’s recognition in Fast Company. The Fast Company story is another topic altogether and that’s beyond the scope of my post here.
My 5 observations from the earlier post is still relevant I suppose. But, looking at Scott’s tweets, I can see that the lines between his personal tweets Vs Ford-related tweets are indeed blurring. Despite his openness on Ford-related tweets, he seems to be using his tweets more to promote Ford and related stuff. Which is perfectly fine too – just that Scott’s followers may know Scott ‘Ford’ Monty and not Scott Monty himself. As long as his followers do not feel like twits, that should be ok too.
Me? I’d gladly promote my clients via my personal tweets (I don’t, right now), but I’d make it sound almost apologetic, as if I’m tweeting something irrelevant. The people who are following me are doing so for a reason and I’d not want to change that perception by plugging my clients, blatantly or otherwise.
If I want to promote my client, I’d rather that they create (or I help them create) a twitter handle themselves and promote it there. That’s proper etiquette, in my opinion. The point is rather simple – social media is for humans…real people. Even though brands do have a significant part to play – because social media is for humans – they are just incidental to the chatter happening. Its almost like an opt-out policy. I should be consciously following a brand – I do not expect a brand to stand behind my friend and shout, even if that friend is working for that brand.