Social is the New Local

It's Social Media Week here in New York, and I finally got to participate in some of the activities yesterday.  I started a new job as President, North America at Cohn & Wolfe so it's been a bit busy to say the least.

The agency hosted a panel discussion yesterday with some of the biggest players in social media including Buddy Media, MasterCard, and Johnson & Johnson.  It was a great discussion with a great turnout, all live streamed and lively tweeted throughout.  It is Social Media Week after all!

There were two standout, running commentaries in the discussion that I want to bring alive here.  When talking about developing plans, the panel spoke about how they are "stubborn with the strategy but flexible with the execution."  Brilliant.  Meaning = do the heavy lifting with creating a breakthrough strategy and then stick to it ... but be flexible in how you execute it depending on local market variables, response to competition, dialogue with the community, etc.  Love it.

The other running commentary was about how "social is the new local," which quite honestly can have multiple meanings.  I'm not sure that the panel meant it this way, but for me that resonates in how social media has been able to bring people together from all over the world and from multiple disciplines who would have never been able to know or interact with each other before.  It has taken a global community and made it local.

Last night was a perfect example.  I was invited to the restaurant Tao for an Influencer Dinner by the #smsix ... a group of six people who are basically just doing some darn cool things in social media.  They invited a few of us from all over the country and from many different aspects of the industry.  Back in the day, we would have never had the chance to know each other, compare notes, and talk about new ideas.  It would have never happened.  But with social media, here we are sitting at one small table sharing a glass of wine and some awesome food.  Social is the new local.

Isn't that was Social Media Week is all about?

What's your experience?  Jim.

Jim Joseph
President, North America of Cohn & Wolfe
Author of The Experience Effect series
Professor at NYU


PS - Join in the live tweeting during The Academy Awards about all the marketing at #OscarExp, Sunday 2/26 at 6:00pmEST --- #OscarExp