Social Media Marketing

I've been chatting with Segun Osu at Business Buyguide.  He's got one heck of a concept, especially for the recession.  Most folk want sales leads.  Segun's concept is to supply them with well qualified buyers who are ready to receive a quotation.  That's a terrific concept.

We were discussing more ways of reaching what he calls "Committed Buyers".  I like that term.  And we were exploring social media as a marketing concept.

I'm in two minds.  I know that places like Twitter are business oriented as well as consumer oriented.  I know that corporations like Dell are making money there.  But I also think one has to be very clever when breaking in to it.

Maybe I'm old-school, but I'm allergic to being sold to when socialising.  Having the AmWay presentation turn up when I went to a friend's house for a meal is not my idea of fun.  So how does marketing fit with, eg, Twitter?  How with Facebook?

And if you make a huge faux pas, does that follow you around for the rest of your life?  Any experts out there care to help me?