Comments on: Do You Trust Your Brand to Ghosts?

By: Rae Hoffman

Rae Hoffman — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:19:04 +0000

@nivu I’m actually going to correct you on calling Lisa a hypocrite here, because you’re dead wrong. I am who runs the Outspoken Media Twitter account and my usage of it has been an internal source of difference of opinion since the day it was erected. I personally have 4500+ followers and follow less than 100. And I get a lot of flack for it.

When we erected the @outspokenmedia account, I decided to take a different approach and see “what I was missing”. So I sought out people with like interests and followed them. The goal was to see the difference. To experiment. And now that I have, I’ve been pruning the account a bit because I’ve learned what I needed to learn now and want to get it to a comfortable level that works for us. Since we have three people twittering on the account (though using the strategy of one currently), we also can follow a bit more than individuals.

So, while I appreciate you taking the time to comment, you’re wrong on Lisa being a hypocrite. The fact is that we’re a company of three and sometimes we don’t always have the same exact line of thinking or (as in this case) we experiment. However, thanks for getting me a glare from Lisa I can feel from a few hundred miles away from her as she knew someone was eventually going to say something about our Twittering, that *I* have been primarily in control of. ;-)

By: nivu

nivu — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:38:37 +0000

I think you’re being a bit of a hypocrite here. Outspoken Media has a Twitter account which is following more than 4000 people. You can’t have genuine conversations with all of them.

The problem with branding and marketeers is that they only seem to be talking. They don’t seem to be listening. But that’s a whole other story I guess.

By: NatHistoryWhale

NatHistoryWhale — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 19:08:38 +0000

Ummm… one flaw in your earlier argument Lisa. I don’t work for the museum.

By: Purposive

Purposive — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 03:38:07 +0000

I don’t think there’s harm in it per se but someone still has to monitor what’s being said. Yes, it’s easier to edit than to write from scratch but it still takes time.

One crucial factor with hiring ghostbloggers is that they must be able to understand a company’s industry well enough to generate original ideas and content. Ad agencies may do a good job (and surprisingly so since there’s often a lot of staff turnover…) but that’s I would think that it’s more likely the case for brand name and larger companies. Smaller businesses may outsource this type of work to overseas companies and I’ve seen them produce disastrous results.

By: Adam

Adam — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 18:42:45 +0000

The crux of what you wrote Lisa and what Michael is saying in the comments is the same. Great content is king. Ideally, you want someone in-house to write that great content but the important thing to focus on is making sure the content is great. If you have to bring in outsiders to write that content, so be it.

Hiring a random ghostwriter to blog/tweet for you likely won’t work. But if you take the time to find someone who is passionate about your niche and can be a chameleon and integrate themselves into your brand, what’s the harm in it?

Tons of companies outsource their advertising campaigns to ad agencies, do they lose their soul too? I’d argue they don’t and most of the successful ad campaigns that people remember and talk about are created by outside ad firms who understand that company’s brand and how to portray it publicly.

By: KJ Rodgers

KJ Rodgers — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:31:45 +0000

This is a great article and it proves the two twitter types, those who engage socially and those who just say look at me. The “look at me’s” with out credibility just looks like the “getcashforfollowing” guys.

By: Lisa Barone

Lisa Barone — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 12:57:03 +0000

Jon DiPietro: I’m not sure whether or not content is Guy’s brand, but it’s an interesting argument. I don’t really care how he uses Twitter, to be honest, as long as he’s respectful about the people who choose to follow him (I’m not one of them). But that’s my issue. I like to respect people.

Miranda: That is perhaps one of the creepiest things I’ve heard, but probably very, very accurate. :)

By: Miranda Rights

Miranda Rights — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 23:43:28 +0000

The secret to getting a good ghost is to find someone who closely approximates you and wants to be you. (Like that movie in the 80′s with Jamie Lee Curtis) Single White Female. Yes. You need a single white blogger / single white tweeter.

By: SEOAly

SEOAly — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 03:59:05 +0000

By the way, if the someone with the customer service or sales skill doesn’t come with writing skills, consider getting a college English or journalism major and have them work together. It’s not the best option, clearly…but for some small business owners whose budgets seem to shrink every day, it can be a “better than nothing” solution.

By: SEOAly

SEOAly — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 03:55:00 +0000

If you can’t actually engage with people personally – which would almost always be the preference – at least try to identify someone in house that has good customer service or sales skill, along with a little bit of passion for the company or its products. It certainly helps if they’ve been with the company a while. They’re likely to have a better understanding of the business side of things, as well as some enthusiasm for becoming involved in the online community they’re trying to connect with.