Welcome to Saturday Night at the Movie
About a week ago I saw this video from IBM over at Client Magnet.
Of course, it doesn’t show the experience of anyone we know.
A visit to their site shows that IBM doesn’t offer much in the way of community connections. Don’t they think any friends are important?
Social media connects information and relationships. It offers a venue for people of likeminds to find each other — it’s unlikey we could do it any other way in such numbers. It’s great way for a company to get to know its customers.
Social networking is about the quality of relationships, not the quantity.
Do you find many people like this guy when you’re at your local social networking site?
–ME “Liz” Strauss
I find this whole ad campaign from IBM annoying. It’s a classic FUD approach playing to the uncertainties of senior execs and sucking up to their sense of power.
Teams in real organizations get put together based on real relationships among people; not on the answers from queries into an expertise locator any more than from browsing a list of imaginary friends in facebook. The question about all these tools is do they help you establish, nurture, and maintain the real relationships that you depend on.
Hi Jim!
It’s filled with something.
Her relationship with the guy at the computer isn’t one that represents connection. So I don’t know what the ad is really trying to say. . . . it implies it’s got something better to help her find that team she’s looking to gather. I don’t see what IBM has that can connect that way.
That is too funny. Funny but true. Often people lose sight of what social networking is designed for, networking.
I do however believe that business networking on social networking sites is definitely on the rise.
Though a recent happy convert (thanks in part to lady named Liz) to social media, that’s now on my A-List of videos on that topic.
I would’ve been the exec a year ago.
Live and learn.
That video is too funny!
Social media is great for it’s ability to connect people. It’s ability to form genuine relationships…friendships. Some people play it by the numbers game (and I say to each their own). I’ve always found that if you speak from a place of sincerity, the rest will follow. Optimistic? Perhaps. But true.
Thanks for sharing this Liz, what say we do a social media challenge?
Let’s hit our networks and see if we can find that team – the one the exec is looking for!
Using Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. we should all reach out with these specs and report back when we get ten names.
*10 international finance experts with 10+ years experience,
*speak cantonese,
*know merger arbitrage
Ready, set, go!
Hi Kurt!
I agree. Not only do I think that business networking is on the rise, but as we do more of it, we get more efficient at making the system useful.
Hey BawldGuy!
I was pretty sure you would like that video. The humor is fun. Too bad there’s not a hero in it. 🙂
Hi Ricardo!
Those who follow the numbers get a number of followers. 🙂
I like to know who’s in the group that’s watching me closely . . . ahem or has signed up to do that. 🙂
@Stephen!
Fun challenge you’ve set there! I’ll try to scrape out a few minutes to see whether I can add something to the mix. 🙂
I posted it a couple of places, since its Sunday it may take a day or two. I am looking forward to see what happens. Taking the lovely bride to Rockland now, have a great afternoon.
PS I updated that site that I sent you a link about…
When I first saw that commercial, I realized that I know three specific people who could probably put me in touch with Catonese-speaking international finance experts. All from a small town in Oklahoma.
Hi Stephen!
It will be fun to see whether anyone gets involved. 🙂
Becky,
It doesn’t surprise me that you know such exotic creatures!
As an IBMer closely involved in our social computing, and social networking efforts (inside and outside IBM) I think this ad, and others like it, sometimes send the wrong signal or confuse people. IBM is very interested in the power of social computing and networking. The tongue-in-cheekiness of this ad is, I think, meant to suggest that their are serious reasons for businesses to pay attention to social networking, and that simply collecting “friends” is an example of less purposeful networking. That being said, I think the real power of social media is to create more meaningful bonds between people, even in business relationships which are, at the end ofthe day, still human interactions.
In terms of current social networking projects, we have very large community in developerWorks, and have a growing business network for IBMers past and present called the Greater IBM Connection.
http://www.ibm.com/ibm/greateribm/
And out Lotus software division is aiming to lead in enterprise social networking with its Connections suite, which includes blogs, activities, profiles, communities, bookmarking, etc.
I wish our community page was easier to find on ibm.com, but here’s the link:
http://www.ibm.com/community/
I also just noticed that on ibm.com we have a new feature on social computing called:
Web 2.0 Goes to Work for business
http://www-306.ibm.com/software/info/web20/?sa_campaign=message/laft1/all/laft1
Hi Jack,
Thanks for coming and for taking the time to let us know so much about what’s going on at IBM. I went over to check things out and saw a lot of cheerful conversation. It almost felt as if everyone was an IBM employee — though some commenters on the blog obviously were not.
Creepy though was that, when I tried to use the “back” button on my browser to return here, no matter how I clicked IBM wouldn’t let me leave the community. Not good.
If you don’t pay special attention to your social networks, you shoot yourself in the foot every time… and then there is word of mouth.
Thanks,
JR
hi Liz, couldyou kindly get in touch with me. I would like to taje some professional blogging lessons. I would appreciate it and price is a concern. Thanks
Roberta