We all know the online world moves fast. Ideas can be spread in an instant. Technology changes seem to happen in the blink of an eye, and many have come to expect all aspects of business to move and grow at that same rapid pace. Sometimes no matter how fast technology moves, other meaningful growth in business still does (and should) take its sweet time.

I had a recent client with a very small start up consumer product company. The brand has a website with online shopping, a Facebook page and a Twitter profile. Tiny sales and a tiny following is what they had. But that’s ok, because they were just starting. I was hired to do some outreach work to promote the brand online. I got to work and started getting some good response online to the product. Buzz was starting. People began to enthusiastically talk online about the product. Traffic to the company’s site was starting to increase. Their Facebook and Twitter interactions increased. And yes, their sales increased a little bit too. I was feeling pretty good about what I had started for my client.

But in a short period of one month, they decided to abandon the outreach simply because it didn’t result in a huge increase in immediate sales. Although sales did increase as a direct result of the online campaign, it wasn’t immediate enough and it wasn’t huge enough by their standards. I tried to explain to them that the campaign was an investment in brand building and brand awareness. I told them that brand building is a process that happens over time, which leads to measurable increases in sales further down the road. I told them that there will be incremental growth, but to expect instantaneous explosive growth is unrealistic. Slower growth is longer lasting and more meaningful. I told them that they were a new brand that no one had heard of yet. They needed to spend some time, get their name out there, get to know their customers and build some excitement and online talk, then they would begin to see some more significant sales in return.

They couldn’t wrap their minds around that. They saw their dollars go out and expected them to double back in instantly in sales. Brand awareness cannot often be measured directly in sales, especially in the initial stages of a start up. Brand building (which in SM terms is essentially the same as relationship building) takes time. You wouldn’t expect to go out on a first date and be married by the second. Brands need to court their customers a while before they’ll go steady or even consider marriage.

I am right there with the tortoise. I believe a slow and steady pace will lead to more meaningful and long-lasting growth. We all dream of instant success. Wouldn’t that make life easier? But it is rare for a brand to find overnight success and it’s even more rare for those that do to be more than a flash in the pan.

Bad boys are no longer in style, and it looks like being good is the new black. Many companies are now incorporating feel good, do good deeds directly into the culture of their business models. It’s not an afterthought. It’s the core foundation built right into the structure of the business from the get-go. Businesses obviously have been “giving back” for years – that’s not new. But what is new is the trend of making the giving back itself the business model, in some cases superseding the importance of product that is being sold. This is called Social Entrepreneurship.

Deeds that were once left in the hands of the non-profit sector, now have spread their wings and landed in the for-profit arena. Some savvy entrepreneurs are now realizing that harnessing the power of doing good can make for a nice profit, an undeniably positive brand image, a loyal customer base, unlimited PR opportunities, and last but not least, charity.

Companies like Terracycle and GotBooks.com are following this basic model, but one company that seems to be mastering it is Toms Shoes. Toms is a company founded by Blake Mycoskie in 2006. Blake is in the business of making and selling shoes, but ironically, the product that his company produces and sells is secondary to what his company does.

While traveling on a polo vacation in Argentina, he noticed that the impoverished village adjacent to the polo field was filled with children who were all running around barefoot. Because these children did not have shoes, they were not allowed to attend school and they were susceptible to various diseases that could be picked up from the ground. On his way flying back home from his vacation, Blake decided that he would start a company that would make shoes, sell shoes and give one pair away to needy children for every pair sold. He calls it the “One for One Movement.” This is all very good. He is doing a good thing by helping needy children, I will definitely not argue with that. But don’t forget, he is in the business of making money too.

I’ve been in the shoe business, so I have a pretty good sense about the cost of shoes. Toms Shoes retail for $48. Knowing approximately what shoes of this type would cost to manufacture, I would estimate that in a typical retail scenario, these shoes should retail for about 1/2 of what Toms is charging. These are basic shoes, known as alpargatas or espadrilles. They are simply constructed out of inexpensive materials by low cost labor in Argentina, China and Ethiopia. There are other similarly constructed shoes on the market selling for about $20 – $24.

My point is that Toms charges about twice what would be expected for a shoe of this type in order for the consumer to pay for the additional pair that Toms gives away. Toms is technically giving shoes away, but seems to be passing on the cost of giving them away to the consumer, and even making a profit on the giveaway pair as well. The consumer really is the benefactor in this scenario, not Toms. Another way to look at it is that rather than Toms selling one pair and giving one away, the consumer is paying for two pair and getting one, so Toms can give a pair away at no cost to the company, and at a nice profit. Toms has also set up a non-profit wing of the company, not for the manufacturing of the shoes, but for soliciting and managing volunteers to distribute the shoes to the needy. The giveaway shoes are paid for by the consumer and distributed to the needy by volunteers. Toms Shoes is a for-profit business, so it seems to me that the distribution of the shoes should be paid for out of Toms’ pocket, not by the donated time of volunteers.

It’s a marketing thing, really. He’s doing some good, helping people, making a nice profit, and making consumers feel good by knowing they are helping shoeless children, and in turn doing some serious brand building. It is a win-win situation for everyone as long as the consumer doesn’t mind footing the bill for what Toms markets to be their own generosity. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with a business making a profit at all, and donating goods or services to the needy is absolutely a good thing, but Toms should acknowledge their consumers more directly as partners in their business model and in their generosity, rather than taking the sole credit for the giving. Blake does refer to himself as the Chief Shoe Giver, but it’s Toms’ consumers who are making the sacrifice out of their wallets, not him.

You all know the scene: Dorothy and her three friends return to Oz with the broom in hand after a harrowing near-death experience dealing with the witch and all those flying monkeys, only to have Toto pull back the curtain and expose the wizard as the charlatan that he truly was. In our world filled with online gurus of all types and sizes popping up on Twitter, LinkedIn and the Internet in general, it’s important for businesses to know how to smell the difference between the real deal and a faker. With the ease of self-promotion that comes with using the Internet also comes the ease for anyone to claim guru status in order to try to win business.

Here are a few red flags and tips on how to be sure that you are working with someone who knows what they are doing:

Using the word “guru” to describe oneself
In its original form, guru was not a self-proclaimed title. It was something bestowed upon a religious leader who was thought to have power, knowledge and insight into God to guide followers from the darkness of ignorance to the light of knowledge. I don’t think they were talking about Twitter followers. If anyone describes themselves as a guru in their bio, I suggest running the other way.

Is the walk the same as the talk?
I came across a blog the other day that is a great illustration of this point. Calling this site a blog really was a bit of a stretch because there were only a few entries over the course of several months and they all were brief announcements promoting speaking engagements this person had lined up to impart his wisdom on how to build business through the use of blogging and social networking. The only problem was that right next to the post was that little blue box announcing that he had 4 feed subscribers and a little blue bird announcing that he had 58 followers on Twitter. None of his posts had comments or Re-Tweets. Looking at his Twitter feed, all his Tweets were link backs to his “posts” on his blog promoting his speaking engagements. Now would you trust that this guy holds any wisdom regarding how to build business through social media? Don’t think too long on that one.

That’s what Google is for….
It may sound obvious, but Google search the person’s name or business and take a look at the results. Hop on LinkedIn and take a look at the profile. See what the person’s credentials are or what he or she has done in the past. You can tell a lot about a person with a couple of clicks.

The proof is in the pudding
On the Internet people can claim to be a writers, designers, social media specialists, web designers, or business advisors. Heck, some people even claim to be 16-year-old girls but turn out to be 50-year-old men. It’s up to you to know for sure with whom you are dealing. Ask to see a portfolio of work or references from previous clients. If the only thing a supposed marketing guru has ever marketed is the marketing of his or her own marketing guru-ness, then beware. You be the judge.

You get what you pay for
To a certain degree, this statement is absolutely true. It’s not necessarily true that the more expensive someone is, the better, but I can guarantee you that anyone who is willing to write some copy for you for $20, design a logo for you on spec, or suggest a tag line for your business for free on LinkedIn is not going to be providing you with great results. Pay fast food salary (or no salary at all) and you’re guaranteed to get work at the caliber of a squished hamburger and floppy fries or less. Do a little research to find out what the going rate is for high quality work and negotiate from there.

Size doesn’t always matter
With crafty methods of getting more followers on Twitter, don’t always think that the more followers someone has guarantees a higher level of expertise. I actually get the opposite feeling sometimes when someone has an exorbitant number of followers…it makes me think SPAM. Remember, Charles Manson had a lot of followers too.

Money, that’s what I want
Another red flag is the use and overuse of the dollar sign and images of piles of money on someone’s Twitter background, blog or website. If money is the primary concern of the message, then losing yours should be your primary concern.

Finding great talented people to accomplish what you need help with is actually pretty simple. When you are looking to hire someone to work on a project for you, use common sense. Do your homework, understand the going rate and maybe most importantly, trust your instincts.

There was a recent discussion on Copyblogger, about the importance of spreading the word when you have an idea. The point of the article basically was that instead of hoarding your great ideas in a file on your computer, you should share them with anyone who will listen to spread the word. An argument arose when I piped in that BEFORE you let anyone in on your idea (assuming it is in actuality, a great one) you should protect it with a patent application, a trademark, a copyright, or at least a nondisclosure agreement. It quickly became clear to me that that the distrust of lawyers is so strong in some people that they would rather risk making their ideas vulnerable to thieves out in the marketplace than trust a lawyer to protect them. I am going to put myself out on a limb here and jump on the lawyers bandwagon for a change and suggest that exposing your ideas without any protection is a dangerous road to travel. I know, I’ve been there.

I have a great deal of gratitude to and respect for several lawyers that I have had the pleasure to work with. In my previous business venture, which involved products with unique patentable features, trademarkable names and slogans, and numerous negotiations and contracts, our company would have been left extremely vulnerable had we had not protected the IP assets that we created. On more than one occasion, the legal protection that we had the wherewithal to put in place thwarted would-be thieves.

Intellectual property is a key asset that adds tremendous value to a company’s worth. Protecting it, therefore can be essential to a company’s success or failure. Here’s why:

Try getting backers to invest in your company if you don’t hold or own trademarks or patents on the products that you produce or on your business model. A business that holds intellectual property is a much more enticing investment proposition than a business that doesn’t hold any IP.

Try attempting to confront another company that is knocking off your idea without any IP ownership. There is nothing worse than having a unique idea, watching it being ripped off, and having no legal recourse to prevent or remedy it, because you neglected to protect it.

Try selling something that is not unique in the marketplace.The lack of proper IP protection also has the potential to devalue your brand in the consumer’s eye. Having a patentable idea which turns into a unique product is a lot easier to sell in the marketplace than something that offers no innovation. Holding a patent or trademark on something instantly adds value because it says that your product, business method, name, idea, or slogan was unique enough to achieve protection. Innovation sells.

Try pitching your idea to an existing business to invite collaboration or licensing. Most reputable businesses don’t want to hear your ideas unless they are protected for fear that they might already have something in their pipeline that is similar. Other not-so-reputable businesses are on the lookout for eager suckers who will unwittingly hand over their ideas. Invent it, protect it, then go talk to people. (A great movie on this subject is Flash of Genius)

I am a true believer and practitioner of the power of word of mouth marketing, creative collaboration and brainstorming, but I always proceed with caution before letting the cat out of the bag. I fear potential thievery in marketplace (and spiders) much more than I fear lawyers.

Domino’s Pizza has recently launched a new TV ad campaign which not only announces attempts to improve the quality of their pizzas, but incorporates the negative feedback from consumers about their product. Now, I know that transparency, listening to your customers, engaging with them and responding to their needs and complaints head on is the hip thing for big business to do in this age of social media interaction, but the fact that Domino’s Pizza tastes awful is not really a new revelation.

The thing that kills me here is that this piece was presumably shot in a test kitchen somewhere deep in the bowels of Domino’s corporate headquarters in Michigan. This kitchen is teeming with chefs in white garb scurrying around doing their important work of trying to make Domino’s pizza taste good. Is this test kitchen something new? Do these chefs not have taste buds? Have they never taken a bite of their own product? I find it ridiculous that Domino’s is presenting this bad food issue as a revelation. “Shocking,” as the head chef says. What I find shocking is that a trained chef is so shocked that people think their pizza tastes bad, and that they needed a focus group to figure that out. This campaign, instead of instilling confidence in their abilities, demonstrates just how clueless they are about food.

This company has been around since the late ’60s. It’s common knowledge on the street that Domino’s Pizza isn’t bought for its great taste. The reason people buy it in spite of its lackluster taste, is because it’s convenient, fast and cheap. That’s what they have established as the Domino’s brand. For years the message was all about the price and the speed at which your pizza would arrive at your door. There have been several traffic accidents with personal injury and death to drive that fact home. Domino’s has created a fast food pizza chain, not a gourmet pizza chain, and if the intent is to reinvent the brand now, then I think they have a nearly impossible challenge. It may be a little too late to try to convince consumers that Domino’s is anything more than a cheap greasy pizza that will be delivered to their homes quickly.

The irony here is that the premise of the campaign seems to be that consumers are supposed to feel good that Domino’s cares what they have to say, but if they made good pizza to begin with, then there would be no point to the campaign. Adding garlic and herbs to the sauce, earth shattering! Brushing the crust with olive oil, genius! Using aromatic cheese, innovative! Pizza is pretty basic: good dough, good sauce, good cheese, fresh toppings and some herbs = good pizza. This isn’t rocket science, just common sense: If you make food, then it should taste good.

The big lesson here for a business, whatever it is, should be that it should be the best it can be from the get go. Know what your mission is, know what your priorities and goals are and create your business model to achieve those goals, and yes, make sure your product is good. Understand the brand that you want to build, because once it’s built, it’s pretty difficult to change gears and turn it into something different. There is a learning curve when building brands and along the way adjustments need to be made, but there’s no excuse for waiting nearly 50 years to realize that your product stinks. If this truly was a concern for the brand, then action should have and would have been taken long ago. The priority for the brand clearly has always been low price and fast delivery.

Although some people seem to be lauding Domino’s for their new candid approach to quality control, they have not converted me. I don’t believe that the “chefs,” given their shock, have the ability to know the difference between good and bad, and I don’t understand why it took a food company so long to figure out that their food doesn’t taste good. Instead of creating confidence in the brand, it demonstrates their lack of understanding of their own market and their own products. It will be interesting to see if they can convert the masses on this one.

A similar question was recently posed in an online discussion. Some people answered this question quickly by saying that ideas are worth absolutely nothing until someone puts money down on the table for them. I wholeheartedly disagree. Value is not just about dollars and cents. Value can be about potential – for change, innovation, meaning, emotion, function, or design. Even in the context of business, these elements, especially in today’s economy are the keys to business success. It’s the businesses that understand that, the ones that have the intuition and sense to see and believe in that potential, that will be the ones that move on to create the future in business world.

In Daniel Pink’s book, A Whole New Mind, he states his theory that right brainers will rule the future in business. Pink argues that outsourcing (finding manufacturing overseas for cheaper production) and automation and computerization (replacing the information based knowledge workers) are forcing the Information Age to give way to a new Conceptual Age that values creativity, innovation and inventiveness. Ironically, it’s those intangible things like ideas that cannot be replicated or automated, that will give a business its greatest value.

Every business starts with an idea. It can be an epiphany that wakes you up in the middle of the night. It can be inspired by something you see or hear. It can be born from a desire to try to do something better than how it’s been done before, or to invent something that never existed before. But how do you know when an idea is just an idea or when that spark is something that has potential to be big and worth turning it into a business? Oftentimes, that’s where the strength of the conceptual side of the brain kicks in. Studies, focus groups, and market research can play a role, but if an idea is so innovative that there’s nothing to compare it to, then research results may not reflect an idea’s full potential for success. Likewise, if a business relies too heavily on consumer input, especially with a highly innovative idea, the results may be the same. Consumers know what they have seen before. They are not innovators, they are consumers.

In the early 1970’s Xerox created the Alto, considered by many to be the first PC for desktop use. Unfortunately for Xerox, they lacked the vision to see the full potential and the ability to innovate quickly enough to bring it to market.

They were left in the dust when in 1979 Apple Computer’s Steve Jobs visited Xerox and was said to have taken inspiration from their innovation and in turn incorporated similar technologies into the MacIntosh. So when answering the question of the value of an idea, just ask yourself what that idea was worth to Apple. The rest is history.

Brand building and the return on the investment it takes to build a brand are, to a great degree, difficult things to measure. They can be a bit elusive and hard to define. The measurement involves participation in and understanding of a process that takes place over time, utilizing and considering numerous variables and methods to create a sense of familiarity, awareness and trust in a product or brand name. *Note the phrase “over time.”

There are some seemingly lucky dogs that hit on an overnight success, but those instances are rare, and most often only have the appearance of overnight success. The behind the scenes relentless messaging, marketing, PR, promotion and brand building work that takes place is usually not visible to the naked eye. And it really shouldn’t be.

Patience is key here. Focusing too heavily on tangible and quick ROI, dollar for dollar is futile. Investing in a promotional campaign that sends traffic to your site, starts people talking on the internet and elsewhere about your brand, increasing your Google ranking, getting your brand more attention from other media and other venues, though it may not seem like a strong dollar for dollar return, one has to consider what awareness is worth. When does the dollar return come from a promotional investment? Maybe not for months or even longer. What will greater brand awareness lead to? Customer trust and loyalty, new business, and more sales, but it most likely will not be right away. To expect to pay a dollar for promotional work and the next day get two dollars back is unrealistic, but that oftentimes is the expectation when a client asks about ROI.

Data is useful, no doubt about that, but data can be deceiving. If a promotional campaign does not immediately and directly produce sales, but does drive traffic and produce positive awareness, is that considered to be a poor return on investment? I would argue that ROI doesn’t necessarily have to translate directly to dollars out vs. dollars back in. The return may not come in ways that can easily be counted. The return can come in ways that are impossible to measure. It can come from a positive consumer feeling about and recognition of a brand, trust in a product, understanding of and connection to what the brand stands for and what a company is all about. All of that has to come before many consumers will be willing to spend one penny to buy. How do you measure and value the various elements of ROI?

One of the basic concepts in social media and online networking and marketing is about giving, yet there seems to be a lot more taking going on lately. Although I agree that the participation in the social web absolutely needs to have that element of helpfulness, it doesn’t mean that professional creative services should be expected to be given away for free or for a few bucks. Here are a few recent scenarios that have come to my attention:

In various LinkedIn discussion groups:
Someone asking for “suggestions” for a new tag line for their company.
Someone asking for “suggestions” for re-branding of a web domain.
Someone asking for the best solutions to market their brand.

Craig’s List:
Someone asking for product designs on spec: Create it, design it, give it to us and if we like it, we’ll pay you.

Indeed.com:
A prominent children’s brand looking for a product designer to work unpaid for 3 months which “may lead to a paid position.”

Numerous online news or information sites:
Writers provide free content or content for a few bucks an article in exchange for “exposure.”

Online printers:
Offering a free clip art logo with every printing job.

These are just a few of the myriad of examples of businesses looking for and/or taking free or nearly free, design, marketing or content to build their own businesses. There’s nothing wrong with helping people, offering advice and yes, sometimes offering limited services for free or at a discount, but there seems to be a disconnect somewhere that discounts talent and quality which, in turn, devalues and cheapens creative work.

A good example here is the case of the online printing service offering a free clip art logo with every printing job. This company is not a graphic design house, they are a printing house. A more appropriate offer might be to giveaway an extra few pieces of whatever is being printed. Giveaway the printing, not low level clip art logos. Yes it’s a logo, and yes, the customer might need a logo, but it’s not doing the customer any favors by offering them a logo that looks like it was designed by a 5th grader. There actually is no value in doing that, because even if their customer doesn’t realize the low quality, the marketplace probably will, and a poor unprofessional image will be projected.

It seems that it’s becoming a common practice to not only ask for, but expect creative work for free or virtually free. There is that old saying that “you get what you pay for.” This isn’t to say necessarily that the more expensive something is the better, but it’s safe to say that most professional quality work is not going to be found for free. The problem here lies in when businesses don’t see or know the difference between professional quality work and low level work that appears to fill a particular need at a particular time for a bargain or lower than bargain price. Is it really still true that content and quality is king or is a bargain the new reigning ruler? Is this a larger cultural question? Let me know what you think…

I came across a company name the other day and when I saw it, I truly had to do a double take. My point is not to embarrass anyone here, so I won’t reveal the actual name, but let’s suffice it to say that it conjured up images of baking diapers in an oven, quite literally. O – k-aay, I thought to myself. I’m picturing a lovely woman in a nice white chef’s hat and coat with oven mitts and a nasty tray of …oh, I can’t continue. With this image in my mind, I felt compelled to go to the site and see for myself what this product could possibly be.

As it turns out, this business offers is an array of newborn baby items like blankets, and stuffed animals, diapers (clean) and other items arranged and assembled to resemble a three-tiered cake. These so called “diaper cakes” are sold as gifts to give in honor of a new arrival in the family. That’s fine, and although I could see how they actually might be a nice idea for someone who has just had a baby, the name was so not nice. The name did however, do the trick in driving me to go to the site, but I doubt that it was for the reason that the owner had intended.

Your Name is the Cornerstone for all Marketing Efforts

Whether you are naming a product, a business or a blog, creating an effective brand name is the most important place to start in building a marketing strategy. Your name needs to say who you are, what you do, and capture the essence of your business in one simple word or two. It needs to evoke not only an understanding of what your business is, but it should create the feeling that you want to convey. Always be careful not to use something that might have a hidden or not-so-hidden meaning to a different segment of the population, otherwise it might draw in the wrong crowd for the wrong reasons.

Make Your Name Unique In The Searchable Marketplace

In the modern world of marketing, a brand name also needs to be unique enough so that it is searchable without thousands of other results coming up instead of your business. If your name is Susan and you sell cookies, logic might tell you your business name should be Susan’s Cookies, but in the web world, a name like that would be impossible to search.

Make Sure There’s A Primary Domain Available

Ideally you would want your domain to be: www.yourbrand.com. If that is not available, .net is the second choice. You should avoid names like yourbrandonline.com or yourbrandbabygifts.com. No one will remember that, even if the “root” word of your brand name is catchy. Keep it short and sweet.

Protect Your Name With A Trademark

Your brand name also should be able to be trademarked. It’s pretty quick and easy to do an initial trademark search online. If someone else has already trademarked it, then think of an alternative. If it’s in another industry completely, then you could still potentially trademark it, but the best names are ones that have little chance of being confused with another business or contested. Thinking outside of literal terms or making up a word can often lead to a clever and compelling name. Making connections to your brand story or making up words that play with the definition of what your business is can lead to finding memorable names that most often can easily be trademarked.

Naming For The Future

Think about not only what your business is now, but also the larger picture of what it could be in the future. Try not to be too specific to a particular product, when you might be expanding into other arenas that may pose a future branding problem. Kentucky Fried Chicken was faced with the dilemma that fried chicken is not as popular now as it was back in 1952 when the company was founded. People are now interested in more options, like grilled or roasted chicken and other menu items instead. This is why they needed to rebrand themselves as KFC, taking the focus off of “fried.” Sometimes rebranding can work, but most often it fails miserably, especially for established brands. Best to try to anticipate possible changes to your business model at the beginning, rather than facing a rebranding crisis later.

Don’t Fall For Trendiness

A name has to have some longevity and timelessness. Trendy names might seem like a good idea for today, but they won’t make any sense for tomorrow because they will be out of step and dated pretty quickly. It’s like a tattoo – it might look hip when you’re 20, but when your 70 year old body is sagging in unanticipated places, that skull and cross bones imprinted in your skin might not have the same appeal.

Know Who You Are

Coming up with a fresh and effective brand name is not an easy task. It takes creativity, understanding of the marketplace, some savvy use of language, an understanding of your brand as a whole, and even some intuition. It’s like naming a baby. Try to name your business to last a lifetime. (But if you are having trouble, you can always hire me to help ; )

Mommy, There’s A Caterpillar In My Pickle Jar!

When I was a kid, I can recall one day finding a pickled caterpillar floating in the brine in a jar of pickles from which I was eating. The little creature was about the same size as the gherkins in the jar and it had been pickled to that same unnatural yellowish green hue. After I finished screaming out of disgust from the realization that I almost ate the thing, my mother quickly typed (yes, on a typewriter) a carefully crafted letter of complaint to the company. She put the letter in an envelope and sent it off in the mail along with the jar containing the caterpillar. A few weeks later, my mother received a lovely letter of apology along with a slew of coupons for free pickles and other products from this company. She felt acknowledged and satisfied with the response and that was that. It was a matter between my mother and the pickle company.

Today, if that same scenario popped up, a modern mother might run right over to her laptop and tweet about the disgusting experience to her 3,000 followers on Twitter and maybe blog about it with a close up picture of the pickled caterpillar and a YouTube video of the thing floating around in the brine. Maybe some of her followers and readers would re-tweet or re-blog about the experience and before you know it, that one tiny caterpillar in the pickle jar could cause quite a big PR and QC problem for the pickle manufacturer.

Consumer Responsibility

As consumers, we need to know that what we say in our online communities can be very powerful, both in a positive way and a negative way. I think sometimes it’s easy to forget that what we say online is there forever. Once done, in most instances, it’s pretty hard to retract. Consumers now have ethical responsibilities that were never on the table before the onset of the Internet, and were previously reserved just for businesses. Consumers now have unprecedented power to make or break a brand.

Corporate Responsibility

As businesses, we have the responsibility to make sure our practices are above board and our products and services are the best they can be. People are watching and listening, and if our products are not what we say they are or as they should be, then everyone will know about it within a few instants. If we are entrusting our products to the power of social media, then we must be willing to take what comes and deal with it, good or bad. Businesses can no longer keep problems quiet, most often they have to deal with them out in the open forum of social media.

The Changing Landscape Of Business

Social media has changed a lot of things. It has changed the way we communicate. It has changed the speed at which we can disseminate, find and devour information. It has also drastically changed the way we do business from researching, selling, and promoting, to communicating with our customers and colleagues and monitoring the marketplace and our own businesses. Social media has thrust a new age of power, responsibility and accountability onto businesses, consumers and anyone with an Internet connection. No longer can businesses hide behind carefully crafted copy and corporate speak when one customer could potentially create a brand’s name as a trending topic on Twitter for good, bad or evil. We all have an awesome responsibility here to be fair, honest, responsive to both consumers and businesses. Suddenly we are all swimming in the same pool, and we all have to take that responsibility seriously.