There is a quiet yet growing opinion in the Internet marketing stratosphere that social media and all the hype surrounding it is just like the dot com bubble from ten years ago.
Remember that? Everyone and their dog was in “start-up dot com” mode, and the venture capitalists were throwing money at anyone who had a pulse and a computer modem.
The problem was, as we now well know, that frenetic model of growth was not sustainable. Too many of those start ups had no long-term vision or plan. And so the bubble popped, which is what some folks believe will happen to the social media bubble, too.
And when it does, all the people who are jumping on the social media bandwagon today, calling themselves “experts” and “gurus,” are going to be covered in a sticky mess and left hanging out to dry when all the dust settles and it becomes apparent en masse that social media is NOT the end-all-be-all to every businesses’ problems. While tools are very useful for growing a business and building something that lasts, they are not the only part of the total equation.
Even Gary Vaynerchuk, who is arguably one of a handful of social media experts on the planet, says that 99.5% of people who claim to be social media gurus today are “clowns.”
Now let me be very clear about something before I go any further. Social media is here to stay and it does play a role in a company’s overall business strategy. To what degree remains to be determined on a case by case basis, but think about this:
When the dot com bubble burst, did the Internet suddenly go away?
Of course not. So when the social media bubble bursts, social media won’t go away, either. But the huge number of people who have positioned themselves in the marketplace as “social media experts” will be saddled with the problem of not having much to do once it pops — not to mention find themselves in a heap of financial trouble if their only business platform was built on that positioning.
There is a reason for cliches like, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” While it is okay to specialize in one area of the digital media space, it’s even better to establish your expertise in a timeless skillset, such as communications, marketing, engineering, teaching, etc. All these great new tools, of which social media is one, are definitely allowing companies to do more things than they could say, even five years ago.
But it’s a mistake to lose sight of the big picture and get swept away in the tide of what everyone else is doing without any thought to how this trend will play out moving forward. That has always been sound advice, and in today’s rapidly changing tech-based climate, it’s even more important to consider than ever.
What do you think about this? Is social media the next dot com bubble?
