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SOCIAL MEDIA IS BULLSHIT

Brandon Mendelson

A master of online social media delivers surprising back-to-reality advice about building your business through real-world networking.

A provocative look at social media that dispels the hype and tells you all you need to know about using the Web to expand your business In these days of fevered online networking and Facebook friending and tweeting, this savvy, information- packed manifesto will pop the social media bubble and share some necessary truths about what really works in marketing. Entrepreneur and comedian Brandon Mendelson is an expert of social media. As of this moment, he has 865,968 Twitter followers, which in our brave new world puts him as the 331st most followed person, slightly behind journalist Anderson Cooper (#314) and just above Gary Vaynerchuk (#336) and Wired magazine (#384). He has over 5,000 RSS subscribers, a highly visible and regularly updated website, and is a web marketer's dream. But what does he make of all this? Mendelson thinks "social media is bullshit." He explains that all your Facebook friends and tweets mean nothing without a real-world, grass-roots, person-to-person, good old-fashioned networking outreach. From the young entrepreneur to the well-connected web savvy professional, Mendelson will put the power of the internet aside as he explains what you need to do to really connect and grow your brand. Brandon Mendelson is a humorist who contributes to The Huffington Post, AOL, and other online media. He was previously a New Media Director for an ABC television show and a small business marketing consultant. B.J. Mendelson has contributed to The Huffington Post, Forbes, MTV’s Music Awards, and CNN. He has been quoted by Newsweek, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Psychology Today, and Smart Money Magazine, has been a new media director for a syndicated ABC television show, and wrote a college survival column for CBS College Sports.

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Book Published 2012-09-01 by St. Martin's Press

Comments

Journalist and social critic Mendelson yearns to save others from his mistakes by revealing the degree to which social media have been overhyped, providing a wealth of examples from recent history to illustrate his points.... [U]seful ammunition for readers skeptical about the new networks linking the people of the 21st century.

Mendelson dethrones the ubiquitous myths spewed by influence peddlers claiming special insight into how individuals and small-business owners can profit using social media. This small book packs a welcome, refreshing punch.

Web 2.0. Viral marketing. The long tail. These are all terms used by marketing gurus to sell more books and seminars and to get you, the real businessperson, to buy into their hype. The latest buzzword is social media. Mendelson, a contributor to the Huffington Post, Forbes, and CNN, reminds us that the web has always been a platform for social media and that trying to use the latest fads, like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, to build a customer base is mostly a waste of time. Most Facebook pages go unvisited, and most YouTube videos go unwatched. Rather, he says that traditional media like radio and print, along with a simple, attractive website of your own, are more effective ways to connect with customers. Mendelson's message is simple. There is no proof that any of the latest web-based social-media sites will make any difference to your bottom line, and if you are already making money, online or offline, just keep doing what you're doing. It's an engaging read as Mendelson debunks the modern version of the con man: Internet marketers.

Thoughtful and provocative.If you're a social media junkie, read it and weep.

"... journalist and social critic Mendelson yearns to save others from his mistakes by revealing the degree to which social media have been overhyped, providing a wealth of examples from recent history to illustrate his points.... [U]seful ammunition for readers skeptical about the new networks linking the people of the 21st century."

Mendelson's bottom line: what really works on the internet is what worked before the internet: have a good product, use connections, and get the mainstream media behind you.