The world of communication and marketing is worried because of the consecration of digital medias, an highbrow word used to talk about the web by people who are suddently feeling out of date.
For many people, the revolution brought by the web is the so-called new “power” that’s in internauts’ hands. According to me this power, that has to be relativized because old rules still apply and only 1% internauts really use this power, is only one side of a global shift of the point of contact between a business and its environment.
People didn’t wait for web 2.0 or social media to talk about companies and products in their back. Over a cup of coffee, in real life, first, then on forums and, after, on social medias. It changes many things and made them more complicated for businesses is that discussions are scattered all around the web what makes it hard to take an inventory of them and follow them. This scattering is not a bad thing when one know of to take the most of it but causes headaches to people who consider corporate communication as a centralized thing.
Scattering can be an opportinity. The (few) companies that “buzzed” wisely are a good example. Those who crowdsource too even if they could do much better. As a matter of fact, what’s sure is that internauts don’t want to be pulled toward a corporate site anymore. On the other hands they are opened to the messages and to discussions provided the subject is relevant and the discussion takes place on their own ground. Now the only way to adress the audience is to do it on Facebook, Linkedin or any social network of this kind (even blogs but it needs some targetting), most of all if rather than delivering a message the purpose is to start a discussion to get opinions, advices, to ask for participation.
When a business decides to follow the internaut on his ground, there is something to be aware of and an answer to find. Be aware that no one can prevent a discussion from happening and an issue to be discussed. The question is to know how, among all these discussions, some of them will be about something the enterprise wants to be discussed, even questions it would like the audience to answer.

You can find the "original" french version of this blog here

