This is a presentation I held several times during a period of q3/2008 until approx q2/2009. Most companies approached me with an attitude that this "social media problem" could be solved by setting up a website, putting up a facebook fanpage, hiring an agency and done. I had to explain that social media's influence goes a lot deeper than being just another communication channel to distribute corporate messages. Without verbal speech, the presentation is less informative than live (which i can present between 45 and 120 min), but I think the major approach comes across well.

1. Web 2.0 and Corporations

2. Why doesn‘t it work?

3. People communicate like this...

4. ... and corporations like this.

5. So that‘s how they picture a party...

6. ... and that‘s how we do it.

7. Specialists are in charge of corporate communications.

8. Their proposals are reviewed...

9. ... and are discussed and finetuned and polished....

10. ... until someone finally approves.

11. The result is softened, highlyofficial communication...

12. ... that makes it difficult to perceive actions and communications of a company as consistent .

13. There‘s no dialogue.

14. Communication usedto work differently.

15. With an anonymous mass of consumers.

16. Social Media is different.

17. It‘s really hard to listen.

18. There‘s no backchannel to corporations.

19. The customer service is supposed to listen.

20. If you really want to be listened to, press „1“.

21. The staff is well-trained.

22. But at some point, you‘ll have a conversation from person to person.

23. But unfortunately, it‘s often a conversation from a person with a problem to a person with no clue.

24. Who would be better in a call center than the actual product developer?

25. But these guys are supposed to work, not talk.

26. There‘s no dialogue.

27. Mass communication ispatchwork. Get used to it.

28. 350 million 300 million Facebook is not mass media.

29. Our shared Facebook experience.

30. Fanpages and groups are a start.

31. But is there dialogue with 2 million fans?

32. The mechanics don‘t change.

33. Starbucks uses Twitter as customer care.

34. The core skill is no longer marketing, but conversing

35. Employees are conversing already.

36. They are just not allowed to speak AS employees.

37. But they do it anyway.

38. Markets are conversations.

39. Don‘t let corporations talk to people.

40. Let people talk with people.

41. How could that work? There are 5 major challenges.

42. Challenge 1: Time management for employees.

43. Blogs Reviews Challenge 2: Find the right social media tools for your employees and their purposes. Social Networks Communities Micro- Blogging Own platforms

44. Challenge 3: It‘s HOW you say it.

45. Challenge 4: Web Monitoring.

46. Challenge 5: Share learnings in the corporation.

47. We don‘t have thisproblem in most European corporations.

48. Most images from istockphoto.com dreamstime.com And some from the web: Thanks in advance to Kraftwerk, Don Corleone, Lenor, the Lemmings, the Indian Chiefs, the party people and„The Gods must be crazy“.

49. There‘s more where that came from.