Social Media – the FAQ

Some of us in public media are dipping the toes in the water of social media; some of us are still nervous about what all of this means and what risks we might as we increase our exposure to the great unwashed. Jeremiah Owyang, who is a Senior Analyst at Forrester Research in the area of social computing, has started a rolling FAQ on his blog that tries to get at some of the nagging questions facing businesses that are considering launching initiatives into social media.

• #1 What if they leave negative comments on my site/blog/forum? Owyang’s view: people are going to say things about you online, positive and negative. It’s better to know what they’re saying, and use the opportunity to engage people when they’re pleased or peeved.
• #2 What does it mean to be authentic, transparent or human? Among other things, Owyang says it’s about being more open about your strengths and weaknesses as an organization; and (this is important) realizing your brand is partially owned by your community.
• #3 How do I measure ROI? This gets to impact, and Owyang says you begin with the goals you set that led to the social media engagement, and measuring them against such attributes as authority, velocity and sentiment.
• UPDATE: #4 is now available: How do I launch my social media program? Owyang writes about the options, including tapping into existing social networks.
• UPDATE: #5: How do I talk to my executives about social media?

Five pieces so far, an excellent primer if you’re thinking about how your public media organization can and should engage more directly with your audience online. And for those of us who are already experimenting, it tries to get at this difficult piece of measuring the “impact of public service offered” – if I can be excused for mangling a concept on which Jon McTaggart and others at American Public Media are working.

BTW… I included these pieces on my link blog a few weeks ago; the link blog captures the things that I’m reading that I think are worth sharing. You can check out the blog, and if you use Google Reader to track the web, you can subscribe to it and share your links with me, too.