What's The Difference Between Advertising & Social Media?

August 11, 2010 by Tom Martin

As a 20 year vet of the ad business that has steadily morphed his focus from traditional advertising to digital/social media strategy, I get this question a lot. Here's how I answer it. Be interested to see how you respond to it too. Let me know?

Advertising is about selling. Thus, it is based on interruption and scale. Because you're interrupting someone that ideally would rather be doing something else -- watching TV, listening to the radio, reading a magazine or a newspaper, etc. -- you have to do something conceptual to first gain their attention and then reward them for making the effort. Because it is based on scale, you emphasize things like reach and frequency. Ideally you find a place where you can assault the maximum sized target the most possible times. You have to because that target is actively trying to avoid you. Thus, you have to give yourself maximum possible opportunities to interrupt. And when you successfully interrupt, you quickly tell the whole story. You tell the entire story in each and every ad. You want to make sure you don't miss anything the consumer may react to in a hope that they'll react to something.

Social Media is about helping people make buying decisions. It's based on invitation and aid. Because you're trying to help, you don't need a concept. You don't need to reward consumers for taking the time to read your tweet or post, because if you're doing it right -- they were looking for that post to begin with and are thankful you created it. While like advertising, social media would love to have scale -- scale isn't the goal. Influence is the goal. The more you have, the more likely you can help folks decide to buy what you're selling. And you rarely tell the whole story -- in fact in certain platforms like Twitter, telling the whole story isn't an option. So instead of telling the whole story in one sitting, you leave bread crumbs. Like Hansel and Gretel, you leave those bread crumbs in the right manner and consumers will ultimately find their way to your home. But I'll talk more about that idea in a post I'm crafting for next week.

http://www.socialmediatoday.com/tommartin/160633/whats-difference-between-advertising-social-media