Book Review - The Conversation Manager

Reviewed by: Steve Cox, Director of Funnel Lead Marketing

The conversation Manager is a lively intro to conversation marketing and the basics of getting started in social media. No brand or business can afford to ignore 24-million people in the UK on Facebook or 1,000 worldwide Tweets a second, but tread carefully. The book contains flat statements like "traditional advertising is dead" and "this does mean the end of the advertiser", so we need to remember to place social media in context as part of an integrated strategy including traditional, new and developing media. 

The recent UK General Election was a good example widely touted as the first "social media election" despite the fact it was of course a "TV debate election" where the new live debates and old-fashioned print media analysis were far more powerful. Not only that, all the major parties had huge operations in place to canvass votes door to door, real time social networking! 

It's a similar situation with brands. With some notable exceptions like Dell or US airline Jet Blue, social media is not yet a great sales driver.  So, while the book offers a lot of food for thought, it succeeds best in reminding us that brands need to engage in a meaningful way in social media and they need to listen as much as they talk and be entertaining, engaging and interesting - the basics of any conversation.

However, to deliver sales social media, don't forget that they also need to utilise DM skills and practices to ensure yield results further down the line. Overall, The Conversation Manager is an insightful read, underscoring some of the most important lessons for today's marketer. It's packed with interesting research and engaging case studies about those whose clever online strategies are reaping results in a constantly evolving digital landscape.

Article from Database Marketing, Aug 2010