The Blind Tweeting the Blind

"I've often written about 'NASCAR Blindness,'" says Alan Wolk in an intelligent post at MarketingProfs' Daily Fix blog, "the strongly held belief that if no one in your little bubble of upscale artsy BoBo friends is into something, then clearly no one else could be either—and how it afflicts the advertising community. But there's an equally insidious syndrome affecting the tech community: Scoble Blindness."

Wolk defines this condition as the belief that anyone who uses social media will be utterly fascinated by the ideas of influential thinkers like Robert Scoble. When in fact, argues Wolk, his ideas are relevant primarily to those immersed in the world of Silicon Valley.

"Think of how your friends and relations outside the Silicon Valley bubble use MySpace or Facebook," he says. "Are they putting up blog posts about how to increase site traffic? Commenting on Zappos' brilliant use of Twitter? Or are they commenting on their friend's pictures from their trip to Jamaica last month and posting mildly funny clips they found on YouTube?" Exactly. "So what makes you all think they're going to act any differently on Twitter?"

In all of our excitement over social-media tools—and how they work for us—we shouldn't forget what Twitter and Facebook mean to our customers.

While Wolk's discussion focuses on a specific industry, his Marketing Inspiration holds true regardless of your field. "[W]e've got to stop listening to the chatter coming out of Silicon Valley. To remember that the people we're marketing to have a very different view of social media, it's values and uses."

More Inspiration:
Ann Handley: Why Do People Use Twitter?
Mack Collier: Are Companies Targeting the Wrong 'Influencers'?
Toby Bloomberg: Marketers Want To Play With Your (Social Media) Toys

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