The Social Media Marketing Blog: 12/01/2010

It seems that every time Facebook makes a change, it's a major gaffe. With Mark Zuckerberg being named the Time Person of the Year for 2010, you would think that there would be a little more thought that goes into the company's approach to privacy, major UI changes, and how those are communicated to the very people those changes affect.

Just two months ago, Facebook made news with its rollout of new Groups, which Zuckerberg claimed would be "giving you more control." A press conference at Facebook's HQ was livestreamed, people seemed to be intrigued and Facebook got high praise for a smarter approach to filtering out the noise and paying more attention to privacy.

However, as it goes with some celebrations, the revelers awoke the next day with a bit of a hangover. It was discovered that Facebook members could add each other to groups without their consent. Hence, Mark Zuckerberg joining the North American Man-Boy Love Association was meant to prove that even the CEO of the world's largest social network wasn't immune from privacy violations under the new system. He managed to leave the group, but not before the damage was done. People quickly realized that the new Groups settings gave them less control, not more.

But more importantly than the privacy violations was how the company communicated it. As pointed out on the BlogWorld & New Media Expo blog, there was no documentation on how to use the new Groups feature; the notifications features were turned on by default - meaning that many people were hit with a wave of email notifications about being added to groups; and that groups seemed to be governed by the many rather than by the individual who created them.

That's a lot to chew on with little to no warning that such a fundamental addition is taking place. It seems that Facebook wants to act like that other darling of Silicon Valley and social media geeks everywhere, Apple. When Steve Jobs calls a press conference, it's shrouded in secrecy, with rampant speculation about what new gadget (one that I want but don't need), upgrade or pricing strategy will be announced. But the difference is that Apple's announcements mainly deal in hardware. Facebook is a communications platform (web-based software) and the changes that are made to the interface immediately and drastically affect millions of people - people that don't have a choice in these changes.

As a communications professional, I would argue that it requires complete and deliberate transparency when communicating with your user base. This is not the time to be playing guess-what-we-just-did with your customers. Time and again, Zuckerberg & Co. have been taken to task for poor communications with Facebook users, yet the same mistakes seem to be happening.

The Great Page Debacle
And then yesterday around 4:00 p.m. EST, there were some strange changes to Facebook. Suddenly, without notice, many administrators of Facebook pages realized that the tabs we're all used to seeing simply disappeared - without notice. After the panic subsided, the links were visible in the left column, but the filter function was nowhere to be found and it was noted that you couldn't have tab as the default landing site. I began to wonder if Facebook was doing the same thing all over again.

A quick check of Mashable showed the accident being chronicled throughout the afternoon and the changes that were apparent, before this update became available from Facebook itself:

While it reassured me to know that Facebook hadn't fallen into the same lackadaisical communications pattern as it previously had, it left me with two major concerns:
1) Will the prototyped Pages and their functionality change at all, and will that involve feedback from the very community that will use those pages? And when it does roll out, will it be communicated to members in a clear way, with plenty of advance notice?

And more importantly:
2) If such an update can go live to 500 million people at once, is there a "publish" button near the lobby door at Facebook's headquarters that gets accidentally pushed?

Image credit: inF! (Flickr)

Or, as John Wayne once said:

Do you share any similar experiences or concerns with Facebook?

Disclosure: My employer (Ford Motor Company) has a relationship with Facebook. The above opinions are my own and do not reflect those of Ford.

Image credit (top): Gordonblixt (Flickr)

Labels: customer relations, facebook, news, social networks

About Scott

For hi-res, click here

Ranked by Forbes as one of the top 10 influencers in social media, he has been called "an unstoppable force of nature," "the best corporate social media lead on the planet," and Alan Mulally, the CEO of Ford Motor Company, called him "a visionary."

At Ford, Scott heads up the social media function and holds the title Global Digital & Multimedia Communications Manager. He is a strategic advisor on all social media activities across the company, from blogger relations to marketing support, customer service to internal communications and more, as social media is being integrated into many facets of Ford business.

Prior to joining Ford, Scott served as Consigliere for crayon and spent a number of years with PJA Advertising + Marketing, a boutique BtoB agency specializing in health sciences & high tech.

In addition to his professional responsibilities, Scott is an active blogger and podcaster. He writes about the intersection of advertising, marketing and PR at The Social Media Marketing Blog and also writes The Baker Street Blog and cohosts I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere, two literary undertakings. Scott has been featured in hundreds of news and business publications in print and on the web, in nearly dozens of books, and on a variety of mainstream media, including NBC, NPR, CNN and The Wall Street Journal. Scott is a recognized thought leader in the social media industry and frequently speaks at industry events.

Scott received his Master's in Medical Science from Boston University's School of Medicine concurrently with his MBA from BU's Graduate School of Management. He lives in the greater Detroit area with his wife and two young sons, golfs all too infrequently, and has a hidden talent for voice over work.

Oh, and one last little-known fact: Scott coined the Oxford Dictionary of English-accepted term "tweetup."

You may download a headshot here, courtesy of Rosh Sillars; a PDF version of Scott's bio is here .

Books in which Scott or his work is featured:

The Social Media Strategist

Social Business by Design

Digital Strategies for Powerful Corporate Communications

Social Media Marketing for Dummies

Real-Time Marketing and PR: How to Instantly Engage Your Market, Connect with Customers, and Create Products that Grow Your Business Now

Engage: The Complete Guide for Brands and Businesses to Build, Cultivate, and Measure Success in the New Web

Empowered: Unleash Your Employees, Energize Your Customers, and Transform Your Business

Brains on Fire: Igniting Powerful, Sustainable, Word of Mouth Movements

Open Leadership: How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead

MicroMarketing: Get Big Results by Thinking and Acting Small

Spend Shift: How the Post-Crisis Values Revolution Is Changing the Way We Buy, Sell and Live

Power Friending: Demystifying Social Media to Grow Your Business

The New Rules of Marketing & PR

by David Meerman Scott

Twitterville
by Shel Israel

Six Pixels of Separation
by Mitch Joel

Monkeys with Typewriters
by Jemima Gibbons

Read This First
by Ron Ploof

World Wide Rave
by David Meerman Scott

Get Seen
by Steve Garfield

Disclosures/Relationships

Scott is on the board of the Social Media Advertising Consortium

Scott has been named to the Advisory boards of Pivot, SavvyAuntie, Business Smart Tools, The Hive Awards,
Scott is a judge for the SAMMY Awards

Named one of iMedia's 25 Top Internet Marketing Leaders & Innovators

Humongo occasionally does web work for me and designed this site

No animals were harmed in the making of this blog.

Scott Monty Bio

Speaking Events

Scott speaks on social media at events, seminars and conferences around the world. His topic generally focuses on corporate use of social media, becoming an online spokesperson, and specifically on the progress that Ford has made in the recent past. If you're interested in booking Scott to speak at your event, please click here to submit a speaking request for Ford-related purposes or email me at speaking [AT] this site's URL (if you know what I mean) to send a general email request.. Scott's bio and headshot can be found in the "About Scott" tab above.

Who is Scott Monty?

Hi, I'm Scott. I'm the global head of social media for Ford Motor Company. This is my personal blog, where I share my perspectives on social media - the convergence of marketing, advertising and PR on the Web - for marketers, agencies, the enterprise and the individual. This blog contains my personal views. My bio is available here and my headshots can be found here.