The true value of social media as an advertising medium still under review

I read a really interesting article the other day on canada.com entitled "The Tweet Spot: Marketers embrace social media". It talked about the ongoing debate on what the true value of social media is to a company. Because it is relatively new, no good measures have been developed and agreed upon. And determining the relative importance of social media vs. traditional advertising is proving very difficult.

But many of the big guys are using it, and have been doing so for quite a while. Molson Coors Canada is one of them. They recognize social media as "an essential part of overall brand communications" for their company. In particular, they used social media very heavily in the recent launch of their new Molson 67 brand - including Twitter, a Facebook fan page and a partnership with the Food Network's website.

Although they have trouble quantifying the benefits of social media, Molson definitely sees a huge amount of value in listening to their customers, which they feel builds brand goodwill and loyalty. They also see the risk of not listening to customers and of appearing uncaring or disinterested in them.

The article also mentions a negative online review that resulted in a rash of cancellations for a westcoast hotel. The hotel proprietors didn't find out about the review until the damage was already done. Maybe if they had been paying closer attention to what was being said about them online they could have taken action to counter the bad review.

Everything I read these days about the 'new' marketing is saying that social media is the way to go. Forget the old days of trying to push out messaging - companies risk being completely ignored. People will talk about their brand, and companies have the choice to be part of the conversation or just sit back and ignore it.

Even if an accurate ROI of social media isn't found, it is clear that it can have a big impact on consumer opinion. And organizations big and small need to start paying attention to it or they will be left out of the conversation altogether.