During a recent interview on the morning Today show, Channel Nine – Sydney, a much respected Australian advertising executive, Mr Rob Belgiovane from the agency Belgiovane Williams Mackay, who had just returned from the Cannes Film Festival, was asked by the interviewer Carl Stefanovic – “Rob, what was the latest buzz at the Cannes Film Festival?”
The answer was very interesting: “Besides the films, the latest rave and talk is all about Social Marketing and Social Traffic. It was on everyone’s lips and basically was the talk of the Festival.”
He went on to talk in general about the emergence of Social Media platforms such as Google, YouTube, FaceBook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Disqus and others with the message being that these are the mediums of the future. Quite profound comments from such a well respected and successful Australian advertising executive.
In my opinion, when the mainstream media and advertising power brokers clearly recognise the power of Social Media/Marketing at such a prestigious event as the Cannes Film Festival it is, without doubt, proof positive that those who are in on these developments now will certainly reap the benefits and rewards of Social Media in the months and years to come. Web 2.0 is definitely here and proven by the big players who are now seeking to dominate that market.
Without the emergence of gurus such as Simon U Ford and his excellent book, Social Traffic, it would be very difficult for ‘newbies’ to grasp the depth of this new phenomena. Simon Ford stands out from the rest because he actually takes the time to explain, in depth, all facets of Social Media Traffic and Marketing. He has exceptionally well produced videos, blogs and numerous posts across all the Social Media platforms. Simon offers a rails run to make it easier for new arrivals – newbies – to get onto and understand how to handle all these new methods of communication.
The fact that Simon Ford, and his rapidly expanding global group of evangelists and mentors, could beat Google at their own game–by having his YouTube videos rate at the top of Google Friend Connect–is proof positive of his emerging status as a world authority on Social Media.
Perhaps the most endearing fact is that Simon encourages group participation and that there are numerous highly skilled people you meet through Social Traffic. All these people are both very willing and able to help one-on-one, through group Skype chats and/or other forums such as webinars etc — by openly sharing their collective knowledge in high performance groups. For someone like myself, (I’m over 60, and definitely a few slices short of a full loaf) this has been absolutely invaluable.
It’s a very delicate balance. Gone are the ‘old school’ face-to-face hard sales methods. Now through internet marketing one must establish trust in an online relationship by proving the extent of ones knowledge before even thinking about selling or promoting products. Simon Ford is definitely the master in relationship building!
As the old saying goes “You gotta be in it to win it.”