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Brand, Cathryn Sloane, Digital Marketing, Gen Y, Marketing, Millenials, Online, Reputation, Social Media Manager, Social Media Marketing, Young Professionals
What if I were to say that since I played video games all throughout my childhood, it makes me qualified to design big blockbuster video games for companies such as EA or Activision Blizzard? You would think I’m crazy right? No education in graphic design, coding, C++, computer engineering, or the likes, and I am qualified to design video games? “Hahahahahaha,” that’s what I would say!
Unfortunately, Cathryn Sloane (@cathrynsloane25) made this statement a couple days ago about Social Media Managers, which I think tarnished the reputation of many younger Millenials trying to make it ‘big’ in the social media/ digital marketing industry from a young age. I am one of these people. Growing up using technology, and being in high school when Facebook came out does not make me qualified to manage a brand’s reputation online. It’s an absurd statement to say that it does!
I have worked hard over the past years to understand marketing and consumer buying behaviours. I was fortunate enough last summer to have an internship at a Management Consulting Agency, and they ALLOWED me to manage their social media presence, under close guidance from a social media consultant. I learned a lot about social marketing that summer, and have been educating myself about social media marketing ever since. Here are some of the reasons why, as a 21 year old Millenial, I MIGHT be qualified to manage your brand’s reputation:
- I have a business degree from a prestigious undergraduate university, where I focused on marketing. From this degree, I learned critical thinking skills by analyzing countless case studies. I also understand marketing planning, integrated marketing communications planning, and marketing strategy.
- I have a minor in psychology, where I learned the basics of human interaction, emotions, personality, and the likes. I took courses such as cognitive processes, social psychology, and consumer behaviour, which gave me a better understanding of how and why humans are social.
- I received training from Dave Gallant (@davergallant), a social strategist at NuFocus Strategic Group, where I learned all of the basics about Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Hootsuite, Visibli, Paper.li, etc. He taught me all the tips, tricks, and best practices, along with the proper business etiquette on how to use all of these social networks. This education from Dave was the most valuable learning experience I could have ever had to propel my career in Digital Marketing.
- From Dave’s education, I transferred all of the skills I learned to my personal brand. I started blogging, have several social media profiles, and branded myself as a young digital marketing professional. I started building this reputation in September 2011, and I’m still working at it, and won’t ever stop.
- I spend 6-10 hours a day on social media ‘practicing’ engagement with my followers. I spend countless of hours a week educating myself on different social media management tools, analytics tools, best practices in the digital marketing industry, etc. I read blogs, news articles, and watch videos about digital marketing all the time.
- I make an effort to introduce myself to digital marketing professionals, and keep a working relationship with these individuals. I do this because I know that their knowledge is impeccable, and that building a relationship with key industry leaders is a valuable asset! I’ve had online and offline conversations with Robert Caruso (@fondalo), Chris Dessi (@cdessi), Ron Tite (@rontite) and Dave Gallant (@davergallant). I’ve had online conversations with Neal Schaffer (@nealschaffer), Eric T. Tung (@EricTTung), Jim Dougherty (@leaderswest) and Ray Hiltz (@newraycom). I know most of the community managers at Radian6 (@radian6, @jasonboies, @dayngr, @zodot, @MacleanHeather, @jenn_seeley, @MikeGRad6, @bartrand, @amandanelson, @shannopop, @davidbthomas, @julie_meredith).
These are just a few of the things that I do on a daily basis that might make me qualified to be a social media manager, not because I had a Facebook profile since I was 16. Never would I say that I am more qualified than a 28, 30, 40 or even 50+ year old with 5 – 10+ years in the digital marketing industry.
Unfortunately, Cathryn made that claim. She hit the publish button before thinking about the consequences of her post, which is a rookie mistake that anyone that is not qualified to be a social media manager would make. She did not just affect her reputation with that post, but the reputation of all younger millenials trying to make it as a social media manager. The industry leaders aren’t just criticizing her, but are generalizing the arguments to all people that are under 25 years old, which unfortunately affects some of us that work hard on a daily basis to create a good reputation for ourselves…
What do you think about Cathryn’s post? What do you think about mine? Would you consider me qualified to manage a company’s brand reputation online, even though I’m not 25? Please leave your comments bellow!
danielghebert 
I think you make some very valid points here – its not about age but about skills and experience with what you are dealing with. Using facebook, twitter, linkedin etc for personal use is one thing, using it for business is an entirely different kettle of fish and needs a very different approach.
Thanks for your comment Michelle!
I completely agree with you. I entered a contest for a social media internship once, where they asked recent grads to post something on their Facebook walls, and get their friends to like it. The most likes at the end of two weeks would get an interview to become a social media manager for some of their clients.
I wrote a blog post, explaining how ‘liking’ someone’s status, or getting your friends to like a status is one thing, but to generate business from social media is a completely different thing. They disagreed with me, and I didn’t end up getting an interview :S
But I do think you are right. It has nothing to do with age, or how long you’ve been using social media for. But it has everything to do on how much knowledge you have about digital marketing and strategy. 🙂
Hi Daniel, really enjoyed this post.
First off – Amazing intern competition in your comment above. I don’t think you’d have gained much from an internship with an organisation that measures success like that (unless of course you were successful in completely reshaping their understanding of, and approach to social media).
You win this debate hands-down. Michelle raised some key basics that I don’t need to repeat, personal and business use of social media are miles apart (although, there are some transferable skills).
To play devil’s advocate for one paragraph – Cathryn’s post did achieve at least one positive, encouraging you to write this one, and this is a valuable post in the debate around young people and senior social media positions, and more broadly about the skill-set needed for anybody interested in adopting social media as a profession.
I’m curious, have you found that your age (and hence lack of 5/10 years of digital marketing experience) has counted against you in applications for senior social media positions?
In answer to your final question, I imagine that you have the skills required for a senior social media role, although I fear that your age probably will count against you when it comes to some recruiters, which is a shame.
Thanks for your comment Paul! I appreciate it!
Yes, one positive thing from Cathryn’s post is that it inspired this one. I felt like I needed to write this post though, in order to preserve my reputation as a young, talented social media professional.
For your question, the answer is yes. I’m in such a disadvantaged position right now, because I do not qualify for positions that require 5+ years (or at least in the recruiter’s eyes I don’t). Also, people that are recruiting for entry level positions think I am over qualified. So what do I do?
When I talk to people about social media, they can clearly see that I have a passion for it, and that I am knowledgeable about the subject. But again, because I am so young, and I just graduated, they won’t give me a shot. I’ve considered opening up my own shop, but I recently moved, so I don’t have many contacts in my area right now to grow a business. It’s quite the pickle, but I’m convinced that one day soon, the right position will present itself for me. And I’ll be darn sure to take charge of that opportunity 🙂
“I wrote a blog post, explaining how ‘liking’ someone’s status, or getting your friends to like a status is one thing, but to generate business from social media is a completely different thing. They disagreed with me, and I didn’t end up getting an interview :S”
Hahaha.. I’m honestly laughing so hard right now. The fact that they’re looking for a social media intern based on popularity is absurd. Whomever is running their social media department probably doesn’t get it, regardless of their age. 😉
Thanks for your comment DJ!
I know, I had a confused look when they answered my post. I talked to a few people about it, and they said my post made a lot of sense, and it makes sense to get an intern that knows what they’re doing, since they’ll be representing clients’ social media presences. However, the company didn’t feel the same way. Here’s a link – https://danielghebert.wordpress.com/2012/04/18/7-steps-to-achieving-social-media-power/ . The first comment was a representative of the company. I must admit, I was a bit cocky with the post, which I think rubbed them the wrong way, which probably led to me not getting an interview. However, my arguments made some sense, and I’m still a bit puzzled why they didn’t really agree with me. Oh well, it wasn’t meant to be I guess, haha 😛
It absolutely has nothing to do with age. It has to do with knowledge and learning from the true leaders in the Social Media space who have proven results on how their strategies generate not only leads and revenue, but the driving force being solid, long term relationships with people from around the world. Great post!
Thanks for the comment Kellie!
I agree with you on this one! Age has nothing to do with social media management success, but practice, knowledge, and experience play a key role instead.
Reblogged this on Big Dreams, Small Steps and commented:
Perfectly put. Not pushy at all. Great job stating the facts
Thanks for the comment Keegan! I appreciate it! 🙂
I think you have the skills to be a good and qualified technician working under supervision. There are many phases to a career and management is just one and about the 4th step. Sometimes management sets direction, sometimes management is just the people who manage the people who implement the direction of other managers, directors, VPs higher up the food chain.
Junior people have skills. But they lack experience. I would call you, after reading your blog post, a senior junior, or maybe even an intermediate resource.
When you can operate independently, under direction you are an intermediate resource.
When you can supervise and teach people more junior than you in your technical skill you may become a senior resource.
You can become a manager at anytime if you are good with people and can facilitate them getting things done. Being in management does not equate automatically to setting direction for a company, as for example the “Social Media Manager”. It takes 10,000 or so hours of effort to become a master at anything (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outliers_(book)). Until you have mastered your trade, which I will say you are more than on your way of doing, then you could become the type of manager (or director) that helps set direction.
If you spend 6 hours a day, 365 days per year, this would take you about 4 1/2 years. You are about 1/4 your way through the journey in my humble opinion. This is why being a manager under the age of 25 is not really healthy for the candidates career or the organization that hires them.
Thanks for your comment Paul!
Good breakdown of what a junior, intermediate, senior, and management position is! I am not really looking for a management job really, the title of the post was more to spark interest in people that already read Cathryn’s post. I would be satisfied with a junior or intermediate position with supervision (as was my Community Management position at NuFocus Group). I understand that to manage people in a business setting, you require experience, which I don’t have. But that doesn’t mean I am not qualified for a social media position.
Good reference to 10,000 hours of practice! I read Outliers a couple years ago, and that chapter really stuck with me. I’m hoping to reach 10,000 within 3 1/2 years, and think I am well on my way 🙂
Again, I appreciate the comment! Thanks!
Frankly, Catherine has missed the boat completely and made herself sound like a jumped up little twerp in the process unfortunately. Without reading the comments on her post (yet) I’m sure she’ll have some very interesting responses that will challenge her less than learned outburst.
Being there to ride the social media wave when it originally started does not automatically place you as a social media expert.
Firstly, if you’ve been socially successful through social media – that’s great! But that does not make you an expert in managing, consulting and advising on social media in a commercial sense.
Social media has it’s intricacies. However in terms of a corporate marketing strategy, it is a communication channel just like any other. And I mean, that in order to utilise it properly as part of a communication strategy you need to understand what it is, how it works, how people interact and engage through it and how that can be measured to test and improve on – just like any other marketing communication channel.
However, we’re looking at the micro here. Like any communication manager, a successful social media manager needs to understand people and their behaviour (their target audience in particular), how brands work and engage with people, corporate communications as whole i.e. vision and goals + tone of voice and language etc. They must also be intuitive and creative, especially if they are involved in creating and driving social media campaigns.
All of this comes from experience in both life and business. Social media in a corporate sense is just that – A direction to achieve a business goal instructed from the company, delivered in the most natural, open, engaging and social way possible, that fits with the brand and all of it’s stakeholders.
If you can show knowledge and experience in delivering this, then age shouldn’t be an issue.
Thanks for your comment Danny!
Cathryn received a lot of criticism from Industry leaders with that post, which is why I felt I needed to write this one: I felt like her post damaged my reputation as a young professional, and needed to show that I don’t agree with her. I need to get back on the industry’s good side!
Great comment! I agree, using social media personally, compared to business purposes, is not the same. I’ve done both, and I know for a fact that using it for a business purpose requires a lot more work, time, and dedication than using it to like your friends and family’s photos.
I appreciate your comment Danny! 🙂
Based on the posts I’ve read (including guest posts for our own strategy blog) and frequent engagement on Twitter, I can say you’ll be a huge asset to the social media presence of any company you end up with, Dan.
And that is not a function of age but rather of ambition, skill, and personality. The Radian6 Community Team, whom you’ve listed in full here, consists of a nary a soul under 25, by the way. 🙂
Well said, good sir. And thanks as always for the shout out
Jason Boies
Radian6 Community
Thanks for the comment Jason! I appreciate it! 🙂
The Radian6 community team is awesome, because you all know what you’re doing! You’re right, it has nothing to do with age!
Nice post Daniel! It’s great to hear your perspective!
Thanks Kate! 🙂
Hey Daniel,
A really nice read. it was great to come into work today and have several copies of this from people in the agency (outside of the Social Media Dept) as well as from within, all saying I should speak to you (we manage the social media presence for Video Game and other entertainment and top brands). reach out to me @keithpape and we’ll talk more.
nice job!
Thanks for the comment Keith!
Expect to hear from me soon! 🙂
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Lots of people are saying it has nothing to do with age – but it does. Our age group is much more likely to understand the lingo. What’s a page, a group, and a profile? Many businesses still don’t get it, but we walk in the door already knowing the basics.
But it is a combination of that and experience. A degree is good, working with social media on a business basis is great. Simply saying, though, that being on facebook 5 hours a day qualifies you to be a social media manager – no.
It’s our knowledge of how this works combined with our education and experience that gives us to the ability to do something big – like this: http://ericttung.com/2012/03/06/the-best-social-media-job-application-ever/
Thanks for the comment Eric!
That is such an awesome application! Very creative! I don’t see how it has anything to do with her age though, in my opinion, but more about her knowledge. I think it’s just better to agree to disagree on the age thing, it could be a long, tedious debate, haha 😛
I appreciate your comment! 🙂
Thanks Daniel – let me clarify.
It depends on what you’re doing. If you want to take the same marketing, advertising and brand to the online world that you always have, then you could be ok with a brand/pr/ad guy that has learned social.
If you want to do something no one else has done, I think it takes a younger person who’s probably seen more of the successes and gaffes in the online world.
Age and social media use by itself? Not a qualification.
Makes sense, haha 😛
Cathryn’s post was simply about age itself was enough qualification for managing a brand’s online presence. That’s the part I didn’t agree with, even though she was trying to promote people under 25 (I’m 21 myself). She did more harm than good I think though…
This is a great post Daniel. You hit on so many areas and provide great insight. Many who have more years than you could not even touch these and be so eloquent. In my opinion, age is really just a number. I have met some 20 year olds that have more maturity than 45 year olds. I have also met people in their 60’s that would rock at being Community Managers. Not only do they know their stuff, they could run circles around some of us with the knowledge they possess about technology and how to use it.
Some 21 year olds would make fantastic Community Managers because of their passion and dedication to their profession all while carrying out Best Practices in the pursuit of excellence.
Personally for me, it comes down to the individual, their passion, commitment and drive, not age. Experience does factor into the equation at some point and it depends on the situation. Having worked for a brand that was a target for an entire population, regardless of what it did, experience can be a great asset. There are two sides to the equation when representing the brand – your internal and external audiences. Being able to work with your community is very important, but we can’t forget the internal stakeholders, including boards of directors and the C-Suite. That can take a certain finesse. When you are dealing with a potential PR crisis, a Community Manager many need to wear different hats and being able to relate to this audience can and is usually different. For many organizations this is not an issue, but for some, it really is.
Bottom line, age is a number and it really depends on the person and what role need to fill.
Just a little different perspective from the peanut gallery :).
Thanks for the comment Heather! 🙂
I agree! Age is just a number 😉
I completely agree with your insights, Daniel, and with most of the comments made by others above. Firstly, I’ll say it really has nothing to do with age – maybe there are some 21-year-old’s who are knowledgeable and possess the skill sets to be wildly successful social media manager – but I have yet to meet one! As well, there are others of a “certain age” who may possess the knowledge & skill set – but either have no desire or interest to be involved.
Why do I think this girl is receiving all the attention she was seeking in the first place by writing this post? lol!
Thanks for your comment Jennifer! I appreciate it! 🙂
You’re right, it’s a combination of knowledge, desire, and interest. Age has nothing to do with it!
Daniel- this is totally tongue-in-cheek, cause I don\’t want to start another controversy but… with all the reasons you cite for why you \”MIGHT be qualified to manage (someone\’s) brand’s reputation\”, you sound way too busy to have the time to do so!
Seriously, excellent points in rebuttal to Cathryn Sloane\’s article; while it can be argued that she was way off the mark in the tone & points of her article, I think you are a shining example of the type of NextGen person who shouldn\’t be excluded out-of-hand from consideration for a social media management position just because of age, which I think is what one of Catherine\’s major underlying (albeit likely misguided) points was meant to be: that positions asking for \”five to ten years direct experience\” were doing so as a veiled way of excluding under-25s. My take: hiring managers who aren\’t sure themselves what the correct qualifications for SM positions should be, are just looking for someone with applicable experience, and not someone who, unfortunate as it may be for Catherine, takes Catherine\’s view that just because they\’re young, they\’re qualified to manage SM.
Thanks for your comment David!
You make some good points! As for your first statement – “this is totally tongue-in-cheek, cause I don\’t want to start another controversy but… with all the reasons you cite for why you \”MIGHT be qualified to manage (someone\’s) brand’s reputation\”, you sound way too busy to have the time to do so!” – right now, I am unemployed, so I have all the time in the world to do this! I agree with you, if I were to manage a company’s brand online, I’d have to slow down on some other areas, as I would be too busy 😛
I appreciate your comment David!
Confession: I read the title of your post about 15 times before I decided to read the whole thing because it sounded like one of those smug “I have a Facebook account so I know everything” posts. Alas! My loss. You made well-reasoned and thoughtful comments and I enjoyed reading this. I heard about the uproar over Cathryn’s post and personally I don’t think age or when you were born on the timeline has anything to do with your qualifications. It’s truly about your experience, drive and skill.
I occasionally get to work with college students and there is this perception that just because they walk around texting all day that they’re technologically literate. Well, the vast majority of the cell-phone-wielding Facebook-account-holding students I meet don’t even understand concepts like “right click on the desktop” and “no, don’t post naked drunken photos of you on Twitter… what do you mean, ‘why not’?”
Anyway, super post and you sound pretty qualified to me!
Thanks for the comment Carol!
I actually wrote the title of this post strategically. It was two days after Cathryn wrote her post ‘Why every social media manager should be under 25’. I knew there was a lot of uproar about this post, so I constructed my title in the same way. I was hoping people would get the exact same reaction you did, and I think it worked! I’ve gotten a lot of views on the post, and a lot of good comments. Even though my title is of the same manner as Cathryn’s, I decided to write the content completely different than hers.
I’m glad you enjoyed it! 🙂
So, now I had to go read the actual article. Thanks a lot!! (not) I figured hearing about the outrage was enough but it turns out that reading about it was so much more effective. I think her opinion is – hm… gently?… absurd. It’s like saying because I grew up playing cassette tapes that I am singularly qualified to make audio recordings. I think she shot her own argument down when she said “The key is that we learned to use social media socially before professionally.” And there’s the trick – ‘social’ is not ‘professional’. Just like texting doesn’t make you a technology genius and having an iPhone doesn’t make you a computer whiz. Just because you totally “get” how to be social on Facebook does not make you qualified to be a marketer on Facebook. You recognize that business qualifications and professional learning matter. Hey, even professionally trained people sometimes suck anyway. You can never really make any broad sweeping statements. Honestly I think it just shows a lack of knowledge and understanding on her part. Then again I bet she doesn’t have a degree in psychology 🙂
So there.
Thanks for your comment Carol! 🙂 Again, I like your reaction 😛
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