New Media – Standards & Practices

Andy Sernovitz (author of “Word of Mouth Marketing”), speaking at a BlogWell event in Atlanta yesterday, said it has been clear that New Media needs standards because we are all suffering from the results of E-Mail having been launched without them, viz. mailboxes full of spam.

The Social Media Business Council that was established as a result of this awareness has published a “Disclosure Best Practices Toolkit” that we can all access (www.socialmedia.org). My company is a few zeros short of the $1 billion annual revenue required for membership in the Social Media Business Council, but that does not mean we cannot all learn from what “the big boys” are doing in the New Media realm.

Two of my pet peeves: (1) people hiding behind a pseudonym (I recently met someone whose on-line name is “froggie” – what’s wrong with “Anne”?), and (2) endless promotions of products and services (New Media is about listening and building relationships, not selling). What are yours?