Clay Shirky, a prolific social media commenter, gave an amazing presentation at the Web 2.0 conference. His presentation draws amazing insight into the challenges of information overload and our lack of a quality filters to deal with access to such volume of data. Shirky speaks about the centuries old challenge of information overload, how it began with the printing press and continues today.

From a marketing point of view the challenge is delivery the messaging is understanding the current filters and creating messaging that is readily and easily passed along. The idea is not to ‘defeat’ filters, but to increase the quality and and construct of the messaging so that they do not just pass through, but get passed on by filters.

Shirky speaks of the original filter – convenience and practicality. It is neither convenient or practical to read every book ever published. So we rely on social filters to  bring us not only the best, but what is best for us. Social filters are like algorithms – the learn and know you as an individual and can pass forward quality content. In marketing design we are challenged with creating items that are not only good for the market, but good for the individual. Having data in CRM databases helps to tailor messages, but that is valuable in terms of direct marketing.

I think the best way to learn the filters in specific social media spaces is to participate and build trust and equity in the communities. Although time and energy consuming, it is the most effetive way to build brand awareness and drive relationships on the web.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010 at 12:08 pm and is filed under digital marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.