Kellie Parker

http://www.flickr.com/photos/hikingartist/ / CC BY 2.0

You’ve probably seen them all over Facebook or Twitter. It seems like nearly every other person these days is calling themselves a “social media expert” with little to nothing to back it up. They have no professional work experience in community or social media. (And no academic education either, because it doesn’t exist.) Their main qualification is that they have a blog, a twitter account, and 500 Facebook friends. It’s annoying, and frankly it’s insulting, to someone like me with over 10 years in the business.

In my reading the other day, I came across a link to this article on Social Media Explorer by Jason Falls. It’s about the explosion of so-called “social media experts”, and Jason’s opinion is that we all just need to get off our high horses and stop being worried about them and what they are doing to our industry. And I don’t think he could be more wrong.

I’ve never really been engaged in a serious business conversation with one of these folks, as I’m usually pretty good at scaring them off once they realize that I actually do know what I’m talking about. But I’ve always imagined the conversation to go something like it does in this video.

Jason opens his article by asking “can we please get off the ego-driven, high-horse pedestal and shut the hell up about “social media gurus?” to which I can only answer… NO. Because this is important.

These so-called experts are giving all of us a bad name. The problem stems from the same problem that caused them to want to hire an expert in the first place. They don’t understand social media. At all. So they don’t know what to look for in an expert. I mean, I don’t know a thing about accounting, so I doubt that I’d make a great hiring decision on our next corporate accountant. So they hire an “expert” that looks good on paper (and the internet), and uses all the exciting buzzwords. And they probably do a few things — make a Facebook page, set up a Twitter account — and that’s it. The company may or may not feel ripped off… but they basically were. These “experts” are preying on people’s inexperience with social media and their fear of getting it wrong (because they’ve seen others do a big painful bellyflop and want to avoid that at all costs).

Jason’s point is that we shouldn’t attacking (or in his words, “whining” about) these people because they are young and trying to make their way in the world. Well, yes but no. In some ways, the influx of “experts” is inevitable because there is huge demand to hire people who are knowledgeable about social media, but there’s no formal education in the field. You can’t (to my knowledge, and I’d love to know about it if I’m wrong) get a college degree in online community or social media. The only way to get experience is to do some stuff ad-hoc (be a moderator on someone else’s forums, for example) or to get on-the-job experience. Take that small bit of experience and combine it with the hiring manager’s inexperience with social media, and you get where we are. So I don’t mind young people trying to make an honest start into the field. In fact, I try to help them along as much as I can. But I think a lot of these “experts” aren’t trying to make an honest start into the field, they are trying to make a quick buck preying on inexperience and fear. I also have an issue with taking on the label “expert” right out of the gate. It was only after 10 years of experience that I started to feel comfortable with that label. Thinking you’re an expert because you have 500 Facebook friends is like me saying I’m a doctor because I’ve seen every episode of ER. It just doesn’t work that way.

So how do we solve this problem? There are a lot of components, and it’s more complex than it seems.

1. Academic education. We need to start seeing actual academic degree programs on an undergraduate level, so that young people can get the background they need to make a solid start in the industry. I have beaten this drum often before, but it’s because I think it’s so important and nobody else is talking about it. The program could probably take from existing business, public relations, and marketing courses, but will need some custom-designed courses. Things like reputation systems and metrics could make for whole courses in and of themselves. Until we start giving people proper education and training for the jobs that are out there in community and social media, they will continue to invent their experiences out of thin air to compensate.

2. Corporate education. Someone, somewhere in every organization needs to know enough about community and social media to make a good hiring decision. They don’t have to be experts, but they need to know enough to spot the actual expert in a field of bullshit buzzword artists. Companies need to stop hiring the first person that sounds like they know what they are talking about because they are so afraid of doing nothing. Until companies stop hiring these “experts”, they will continue to burn companies and sour them on the idea of social media expertise at all.

3. Mentoring programs. Until we do implement the academic programs needed to make this career path sustainable in the future, we need to do something with the new people filling the demand for social media expertise today. Because there is no formal education available in the field, most people’s stories start like mine, with “I fell into it by accident when…”. We all have to start somewhere and climb our way up, and we’re working without a net in this industry. The more experienced among us need to work with people who are just starting out to help them get established, get experience, and get a solid foundation that will serve them (and their employers) well into the future. Until we start sharing our knowledge and experience with up-and-comers in the industry, we won’t have any growth of actual experts in the field. And that hurts all of us in the long run.

4. Certification program. I was at the Online Community Summit last week. During lunch, I was sitting with a group of friends that I do consider to be experts in this field, and the conversation turned to all of these faux experts. One of the things proposed to help solve the problem was some sort of certification system whereby people get accredited as experts (or knowledgeable or whatever) and can use that as currency when interviewing for a job or taking on new clients. I think that this idea has a lot of potential, but also a lot of pitfalls. It would be great to have something that companies and hiring managers can see and rely on when hiring someone. It would also help up-and-comers have something solid to put on their resume. And it’s a decent stand-in for pre-employment education. But who oversees and administers the program? How to they and the program gain the respect necessary for the certification to carry real weight and meaning? These are all things that would need to be worked out.

So yes, I do think that the influx of social media “experts” is bad for our industry. That someone with so little experience calls themselves an “expert” is insulting to the years I and many others have worked in this industry. That companies are falling for their schtick is a big problem. I agree that we can’t be afraid of the new wave of people in this fast-growing industry, but I think that us first-wavers have an obligation to differentiate actual experience and expertise from anecdotal expertise. I also think we have an obligation to continue making the pathway more smooth for others who follow in our footsteps.