Answers to your burning digital media questions

Hey all: thanks for a great start to this semester. Without further adieu, answers to some of your best questions from last week's blog post. As always, keep questions coming in the comments below and Ross will answer them next week!

Broadcast Media has had the power & influence for the last half century. Will Social Media become more influential than broadcast media?

Interesting question. I think we'll see the two converge more and more going forward. After all, are you following "broadcast media" when you interact with ABC News on Facebook – or following along with livetweets during a major broadcast like the Oscars? While we might not watch TV shows through over-the-air antennas or cable TV, I think we still will through online streaming services like Netflix. There's a great book worth checking out if you're interested in more on this topic: "Television is the New Television."  It's a bit of a contrarian take, but is a very interesting look at the future of media and advertising.

The question that I want to know related to social media is should companies be expected to follow back their fans on different social media platforms?

I don't know if brands necessarily need to follow their fans back. For example, if I follow Oreo cookies on Twitter (one of the best brand Twitter accounts), do I really expect Oreo's social media team to read every one of my tweets? What is the benefit to their brand in doing so, and what is the cost in terms of staff time and resources? Odds are, there's not that great of a benefit. That said, I do think it is important for brands to respond to customer feedback online when required. If I tweet Delta Airlines about a flight issue, I don't expect them to follow all my tweets going forward, but I do expect them to answer my specific flight question or direct me to a place where I can get help. For some smaller businesses – especially "mom and pop" businesses that have close personal relationships with their customers – following back might make good business sense, but for large brands, I think it's not that important.

If a brand is frequently responding to customers tweets on Twitter, and the timeline of its followers is flooded with tweets by the brand, doesn't that get annoying, and almost counter productive? 

Twitter only shows you replies from mutual followers. For instance, if Delta Airlines replies to a tweet of mine on Twitter, you'll only see it in your timeline if you follow both me and Delta. If you just follow Delta and NOT me, you won't see that tweet - unless you log in to Delta's Twitter profile on the web and specifically look for their interactions with followers. Because Twitter operates this way, it's possible for the largest brands to directly respond to individual tweets without driving everyone crazy.

That's also why you see some accounts on Twitter preface a reply with a period, like:

.@mehraban My section is better than yours!

The period before @mehraban's username "tricks" Twitter into showing this tweet to all of my followers, and not just people who follow both me and Derek Mehraban. You could use a letter or symbol other than a period too, and it will accomplish the same thing - the period is just the standard convention used for this.

My question on social media is about the future of social media. Are we destined for this "contet hub" of everything in one place? Or are even more social media platforms going to keep being produced? And what else can they possibly do? 

At the turn of the 20th century, many people thought everything that could possibly be invented already existed. They were later proven wrong by everything from the computer to television to – you see where I'm going. I expect we'll always see new media platforms emerge, considering technology will continue to evolve and improve. Who knows what will be next? With virtual reality headsets like Oculus Rift about to really reach the consumer market, I could see a new social network emerging around VR content (Facebook owns Oculus, so they clearly see potential here). With self-driving cars on the horizon, what opportunities does that present for new social networking? I'm excited for whatever is next, and hope you are too!

I understand the importantance of a strong social media presence for today's brands. But, I want to know, how can establish credibility through social media?

The same way you establish credibility in "real life": share smart takes on things. Come up with original thoughts and concepts. Be generally right when you predict things. Be nice to people. Et cetera. There's no quick way to build credibility – it takes time – but it's why it is so important to really think about what you post online. It takes years to build credibility, but it can be lost in an instant. 

Keep the questions coming for next week!