Corporate Social Graph - Michael Myers Q&A Part1

I've recently mentioned that Mike Myers has also discovered the term 'the Corporate Social Graph'. Following an interesting email discussion with him, I asked him to do an interview for this blog on the 'CSG'. I know we'd both value your input on this topic, so please contact me if you have any opinons on this posting (hayden at idealinterface dot co dot uk).

Q: What are the challenges a company a company could face in initially creating its Corporate Social Graph?

A: The biggest challenges I see are:

1. Ability to create and maintain a consistent brand message across multiple branding channels (YouTube, flickr, Facebook, mobile). I’m of the opinion that the best brands are the most simple and this is a real challenge to build brand equity with the inherent differences between the mediums that live within those brand channels (blogs, photos, videos, etc.)

2. Knowledge of the medium. Each medium has a set of rules that require a Subject Matter Expert. That SME is hard to find, harder to keep needs to be passionate about the medium and the rules for that brand channel will change over time. Many of the mediums have just come into existence and we are trying to figure what can and more importantly, should be done with them. Next week Toyota will launch a $4 million dollar campaign on YouTube. This is a safer bet given the traffic and the “lack of interactivity”.

Comments are the extent to which one can interact with Toyota through YouTube. We will see if Toyota responds to comments left.

3. Allowing for real interactivity as if someone was talking to a person and not a company. People want to hear a human voice and giving someone the authority to create that voice is risky and requires a tremendous amount of trust. If the guidelines are too strict, the response can sound canned and no one will listen.

Note: further questions and answers to follow soon