It’s time to stop lying.

In some recent research in Europe advertising practitioners and PR bottomed out of the scale of the most trustworthy professionals. Not surprised? We have got so used to the idea of PR spin and advertising puffery (over promising) that we just accept it as the way.

For years we have lived in an economy in which the business/seller has controlled the flow of information. In this kind of space PR could spin and advertising could promise what they liked nobody really knew better. In the connected economy this is becoming harder and harder to do.

Yesterday when a customer caught you out and they told their friends it was very serious because 6 or 10 or 20 people heard the story. Today you let down the same customer and guess what, the entire world could know about it and it will be searchable on Google forever.

Many times we in South Africa sit back and say “oh well not such a big deal we aren’t that connected” WRONG. Clearly its different in some markets than others but do you know that the amount of computer users who have more than 5 years experience of the internet will very soon be nearly double that of just more than a year before. Seasoned users who know where to look for stuff on the internet.

Consider that there are about seven million Mxit users, mostly from South Africa. Then there is facebook and so on.

News spreads like wildfire. Instead of the customer telling their 10 closest friends they can now tell their closest few hundred thousand friends

At the showcase talk I gave on the effect of social media on marketing last week I was asked the question. “What happens if we go the social media route with our clients don’t we just open ourselves up to being slaughtered?”

The answer is no that customers are talking anyway, you had better get involved in the conversation.

But also here is a revolutionary idea, how about you as a business develop a value proposition that you can deliver, tell every one about it and then ACTUALLY deliver it then there will be no need to lie.

Maybe people will then start talking about you differently.


Reminder – the 15% early bird booking discount on the social media morning seminar on May 8 is only for booking received by April 15, Its only R1295 (excl) anyway but why not save some petrol money.

Just email Elise at smart@pike.co.za