Keep up the good work….

By B.L. Ochman These days, everyone and her dog is a social media marketer, or so they tell us. But who’s really an expert? And who’s full of hot air? How do you tell the experts from the snake oil salesmen? Let’s define terms: o Social Media Mar…

You are an expert dang it! Don’t defend it – just let it be and move on. Not sure I’m willing to slap you though.

Think of it this way… An expert knows what questions to ask and where to go to find the answers. A lot of people really don’t have this skill.

Joel Mark Witt

first, Chris Steiner’s comment on bloggers reminded me of the idea that bloggers that are prolific posters seem to be labeled social media experts more often than others ( like myself ) who may not be great writers, but still are very active in social media.

i’m not a prolific or stupendous blogger, i write short bursts, but does that make me less of an expert? my bursts: http://www.ericrochow.com

and on the term expert, i think its fine. people can tell soon enough if you really know what you’re talking about; whether you really are an expert or you just call yourself that.

and on being an expert in social media, those of us in this fishbowl are experts in different ways. i have learned a ton from producing Gardenfork.tv and RealWorldGreen.com, mainly from the interactions i have with viewers. Now that i started the Greenhouse, http://thegreenhouse.gardenfork.tv , i’m learning even more.

This is a much different experience from someone who is a text blogger. I’m managing an interactive community, not just writing posts and linking to other blogs.

What I tire of are self annoited ‘experts’ who write/talk about social media but aren’t in the thick of it. They talk about it, but they don’t make it. Doing it makes a better expert than just reading about other people doing it.

Chris, you are, to me, a social media expert. You twitter, blog, utterz, podcamp, attention upgrade, etc. etc. What more do people want before one can attain the expert level ?

Great, thought provoking post. So much so that I have rewritten this comment several times because I wanted to make a point about your statement regarding being “known”.

My initial reaction was that you grossly understated this point. Of course you need to be know. But then the idea of the breadth and depth of social media hit me. Is an expert on blogging an expert on “social media”? Blogging is, after all, a form of social media. So the answer I think could be yes.

Overall, I think the most important point you make, and it seems to come through in the entire post, is: question everything.

Expert, it would seem to me, is just too generic a term to mean much, especially on-line. It can mean whatever someone wants it to, and there will usually be someone who will buy whatever it is that they are selling.