90% of Social Media diagrams completely un-understandable

While at a couple of conferences being shown a dazzling array of diagrams from industry folk purporting to show how to approach something in Social Media I was overcome by the desire to say “I don’t understand what that diagram even means.”

Data Visualisation driven by sites like Information is Beautiful and an obsession with infographics is totally hot right now not to mention that handy Office 2007 SmartArt feature PPT abusers the world over use on a daily basis.

The problem is, visualising something is supposed to make it easier to understand isn’t it?

Today I’m making a statement, via a diagram naturally, on the understandability of Social Media diagrams followed by a round up of some diagrams for you to review yourself and let me know – Do you understand Social Media diagrams?

What is eMarketing?

The Conversation Prism

What they say: The Conversation Prism gives you a whole view of the social media universe, categorized and also organized by how people use each network. V 3.0 introduces new groups and networks and also removes those networks no longer in play. Use the Conversation Prism to see what you’re missing!

Thoughts: Pretty [and that would look super freakin’ awesome on a PPT slide too]

Social Town

What they say: an infographic to better present the idea of how social channels are no longer about singular entities – but more of an interconnected mass of social media. Like any cityscape, Social Town is constantly changing – new deals are made, and relationships are broken on a monthly (if not weekly) basis. Also take note on how certain non-social outlets – like Yahoo and Outlook – were never considered apart of the “Social Media” space, but are now becoming intertwined.

Thoughts: I want to go to there

Bridging the Social Media Gap

What they say: This visual was inspired by some great tips I read in “Sociable”, a new book written by Vancouver entrepreneurs, Shane Gibson and Steve Jagger.
The book offers up some excellent examples of how to take online relationships to the next level by bridging the social media gap through face-to-face interaction.

Thoughts: This reminds me of Bonnie Tyler, David Copperfield and the Grand Canyon

Spectrum of Online Relationships in Social Media Marketing

What they say: By classifying social media conversations into three categories – Exposure, Engagement, Collaboration – based on the Spectrum of Online Relationships that underpin them (fig 1), we can group their associated metrics and monitoring approaches (fig 2). Then by examining the overall performance of the activity in each category we can begin to establish the effectiveness and conversion rate of social media campaigns and ongoing activity.

The idea is to simplify all the different effectiveness measures out there so comparisons/trends can be made and then these can then used alongside true Social ROI calculations.

 

Thoughts: If you move your head closer and further away, really fast, while looking at this image it’s almost like it’s alive and pulsating.

A conversation…

What they say: [Nothing]

Thoughts: People with curly hair and boobs like talking about Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Skype just as much as bald men.

Business Social Media Marketing: Two Things You Must Never Do!

What they say: In my entire time as a social media strategist, the greatest challenge that I have met is trying to convince a company that has tried some business social media strategies and failed, that social media can still work for them. It has now become a great concern for me that a good number of businesses are failing in their implementation of social media for business. I have therefore decided to put together some important tips to cushion you from such failure.

Thoughts: Um

And no tongue-in-cheek list could be complete without including my own cack-handed efforts to visualise something important about Social Media which also attracted it’s fair share of commentary.

SoTech infographic v1.0

What they say:

It’s not social media
It’s not PR
It’s not marketing
It’s simply the evolution of business

Why we believe the next Social Media talking points should be more about enabling businesses and less about racking up followers.

Come on, don’t leave me hanging, post links to your favourite diagrams below?