The Mean Streets of Social Media

Posted by Sarah Mitchell on 4 April 2011 | 14 Comments

Tags: social media, twitter, linkedin, email marketing

Have you ever had one of those weeks? I've been on the receiving end of criticism as it relates to my social media activity. In a little over 10 days, I've been reported to MailChimp for SPAM, publically outed on Twitter as a SPAMMER, and accused by the moderator of a LinkedIn discussion group as partaking in `cheap advertising'. In every instance, my first reaction was surprise followed by wonder. After that, it gets a little murky.

E-Mail Marketing gone bad
The person reporting me to MailChimp was a regular reader of my `blog by email'. Of the nearly 50 posts sent to the address, every one of them was opened at least once. Several of the posts received click throughs. The final post I sent was reported to MailChimp as SPAM.

Twitter Trouble
On Twitter last week, I was graced with this mention from someone I had never heard of before:

"how is it that I randomly end up following spammers like @globalcopywrite ?? It amazes me that they exist on this planet to spam."

I did a quick check of my timeline to see where I went wrong. I had one link to my website in the previous four days. No other tweets were related to me or generated income for me. The criticism was completely out of left field but it stung, for sure.

LinkedIn Hostility
I added my blog post from last week, 20 Guidelines for Twitter Success, to several discussion groups on LinkedIn. I don't add every post but practical advice on social media is always well received and usually garners a lot of discussion. Away for most of the week, I didn't participate in the discussion but noticed a lot of activity in one of the groups. Later in the week I was sent a nastygram warning me I was in violation of the group rules. Interestingly, the person sending me the note had steered the discussion away from my article to one they had authored and carried on for five days before sending me a terse warning about my bad behaviour.

The Fear of Public Attack
One of the biggest reasons businesses avoid adopting a social media strategy is fear of attack in a public forum resulting in brand damage. Speaking from experience, it's an uncomfortable situation. I've encountered it in the past (read my post on dealing with social media hecklers) but never in so many channels in such close frequency.

The Library vs. The Bookstore
The most puzzling thing is the SPAM accusation. I have not monetised my blog or my website in any way. I do not participate in affiliate marketing. I do not derive revenue from ANY of my social media activity. To put it another way, I'm a library, not a bookstore. In the truest sense of content marketing, I'm giving everything away to anyone that wants to consume it. An allegation of SPAMMING is serious. When it's not true, the person making the claim damages their own credibility.

Lessons Learned
While the experience rattled me, it's also taught me a few lessons.

1) It's pretty easy to figure out who is in your camp and who isn't. If you subscribe to a list and actively engage with the content, you're hardly being SPAMMED.

2) If you build quality networks, you don't have to do a single thing to defend yourself against false accusations. Several people rose to my defence after the Twitter comment both directly and indirectly. I'm very grateful to Paul Pichugin from Blaque Studios - @paulmp - who confronted the Tweep making the allegation. Several other people in my network quietly closed ranks making super nice mentions and sharing my post.

3) A networking group with hostile moderation serves no purpose. It's made me evaluate my participation in networking groups, both online and offline. I've currently pared my membership down to a handful of key groups. I look forward to a reduction in the barrage of requests to connect with total strangers.

The Take-Away
Undeniably, it was a tough week. At times, I considered chucking it all in to focus only on my writing. While I'm not generating any revenue with my social media activity, I certainly benefit from the wealth of knowledge available and an amazing bunch of extremely generous people. There's a lot more to lose by checking out than I could possibly gain. More valuable, I've been given rare insight into who has my best interests at heart and who doesn't. Unfortunately, name calling and bullying are a normal part of life. The only way to productively deal with it is to take it in stride and keep moving forward.

Have you ever been attacked or chastised in a public forum? What happened?

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