Will 2010 Be the Year Social Media Salaries Start to Make Sense?

With 15,740 social media experts out there, it's no surprise that there are lots of 2010 social media prediction posts out there. A running theme among these posts is, again, not surprisingly, that 2010 will be the year the community/social media manager position becomes mainstream.

• 2010: The Year of the Community Manager


• 10 Crucial Roles of a Social Media Director in 2010


• Your 2010 Social Media Plan, get that person hired


• Looking for a Second Career? Consider Being a Community Manager

I agree that 2010 will see a lot of social media/community manager hires; unfortunately, as I've blogged about MANY times already, the titles and salaries associated with the position commonly called community manager or social media manager are all over the place. On one end of the spectrum, you have companies who think the position is perfectly well-suited to an unpaid intern or volunteer; on the other end, you have consultants charging basically whatever they want because, well, they can. The salary discrepancy is even worse in the association world; there are basically no benchmarks against which to classify positions such as mine--online community & social media manager--so assigning a salary to it is basically spinning the wheel and seeing what you get. In the association world, where salaries are set by comparing the position to a like position at other associations, what do you do when there are hardly any like positions? The process, in my opinion, is arbitrary, at best.

So hopefully, as more companies (and, hopefully, associations) ramp up social media hiring in 2010, clearer lines will begin to be drawn as far as what the position is called and what the appropriate salary for it is. I personally am committed to trying to shed as much light on this issue as possible because already women are bearing the brunt of the ambiguity--in 2009 alone the gap between the average male and female online community/social media salaries widened, with men earning an average of $86,644 (up from $85,423 in ’08) and women averaging $75,624 (down from $77,319 in ’08). Not cool for women, and also not cool for interns who are doing a job for free that is apparently worth a decent chunk of change. Also not cool for association staff who are not earning anything near those averages.

My association friend and colleague Ben Martin has put together a social media salary survey to try to gather and disseminate as much information as possible. Please--if you have a social media job, do me a favor and take his survey--the result will hopefully be more clearly defined job roles, titles and salaries for all involved in--or aspiring to--online community and/or social media positions.

Certifiable?

This just in: there are 15,740 Social Media Experts on Twitter. What does this mean? In case you don't feel like clicking through and reading that link I'll sum it up for you: it means that we're all in danger of being hoodwinked by some of these self-professed "experts." How do we solve this problem? Clearly, what would delineate the wheat from the chaff in this situation is a CERTIFICATE. Like the kind you can already buy for $3,000.

I'm not understanding Pete Cashmore's argument that "Without [social media certification] such stats provide fodder for those who would say that social media – which is touching every industry from entertainment to air travel – is simply hot air."

To me, social media certification would do the exact opposite of what he's inferring; it would prove that social media is simply hot air--an insta-career anyone can purchase rights to for a price.

Come on, people, use your noodles. Is the only determining factor with regard to whether any professional is an expert in his/her field that he or she is "certified"? No. It's about credentials, track record, degrees, on-the-job experience...not things that are available to anyone for a price like Twitter followers or social media certification.

End of Year Musings

I don't know if it's because it's the holidays or because I have barely been out of the house in weeks and the recirculated air is beginning to rot my brain but I'm finding myself at a bit of a social media impasse recently. More and more, the concept of "social media" is being paired with "marketing" to the point that, frankly, the subject is losing its luster for me. Marketing is not that interesting to me; certainly not interesting enough that I feel moved to take time out of my day several times a week to write about it. I am not a marketer. I blog because I love to write, and I use online tools like Facebook, Twitter and others to communicate because I have a two kids, a husband and a house to take care of, as well as a full-time job--I don't have a lot of time for socializing other than the kind you can do online. I know that it's possible to have meaningful relationships online and I know the internet is a powerful tool for connecting with people outside the small geographical area in which we each live.

Frankly, the snakeoil/sleaze factor of social media of late is getting to me. The amount of money some companies are charging--and paying--for stuff like setting up a Twitter account or a Facebook page or doing a blogger outreach campaign--is, frankly, stultifying. My boss and I had a conversation about this recently--he worked in San Francisco during the dot com bubble and he said that what's happening now feels exactly the same as that whole thing felt back in the dot com hay-day. The gold-rush mentality, the crazy money being thrown around, the opportunists creating stuff because people were willing to pay any price because, well, who really knew why. We all know how that ended.

Add to that the whole rockstar component of this whole thing ("Internet celebrity"? Seriously?), the bullshit factor, the fact that half of it doesn't even work half the time (I've said it before and I'll say it again now--the fact that Facebook and Twitter are so prone to crashing, viruses, hacks and who knows what else just doesn't jive with the billions of dollars both are allegedly worth), the focus on number of followers and fans whether those numbers mean anything or not, the fact that we're all basically talking about the same things over and over again....I'm just starting to not feel it.

What to do about it? Break up with social media, like Suzemuse? Blog about something else? Quit blogging altogether and get started on that novel once and for all? I'm honestly not sure.

In the meantime, I'll say this. For all the talk about social media and ROI, to me, this comment made by a member when I posted on Facebook that I had returned to ASHA is what I consider to be positive social media ROI:

You are the Mother of my Facebook. Because of you, I started it. Look at me now.

In other words, to me, it's not about numbers, it's about relationships and helping people connect.

Why Brazen's Top 50 Gen Y Companies List is Horse$hit

I have to start by saying that I LOVE Penelope Trunk--love, love, love her. Which is, I guess, why I'm so surprised and disappointed by her company, Brazen Careerist's, Top 50 Gen Y Companies list. These were among the criteria companies had to meet to be considered for this list:

1. Had to have more than 2500 employees. Um, what? Why?


2. Had to employ "2000+ bachelor's degree or higher graduates in order to limit the sample to companies that are major employers of bachelor's (or higher) graduates. Huh? I don't even understand what this means.


3. Percentage of Gen Y employees. Ok, this kind of makes sense.


4. Median total cash compensation of Gen Y employees. I thought Gen Y doesn't care about money, they just want to save the world?


5. Gender balance. Good--no argument here.


6. Green score, as determined by Climate Counts. So, what--did Climate Counts partly sponsor this list or something? Otherwise, wtf?

That's it? That's truly all Gen Yers care about when looking for a job? Are you kidding me? I might not be a Gen Yer, but I read the paper and lots of blogs and watch the news. I thought Gen Yers don't want to follow in their parent's footsteps, don't want to sell out to the man, want to save the world, want work/life balance, want cool work environments...basically, do NOT want to work for big corporations like Pepsi or Citicorp. Why on earth would this list not include companies with fewer than 2,500 employees? Doesn't that pretty much automatically keep any nonprofit organization out of the running off the bat? Where are the criteria like social responsibility score, commitment work/life balance, professional development, etc?

To me this list is basically an ad for Payscale and totally flagrant in its disregard for actually being useful to Gen Yers researching potential employers. I mean, everyone's gotta eat and pay the bills, but come on Penelope--you couldn't do better than this?

How about doing another list--this time not using total bullshit qualifications and including nonprofits?

Update: Penelope wrote a post defending the methodology they used to come up with the list. Nice try but, sorry--no cigar. "If a company has a strong green initiative it’s because they understand the value of being a good corporate citizen." No, it's because they understand the value of greenwashing.

What if Your Big Idea Meant You Were Out of a Job?

This question from Peggy Hoffman got me thinking--because of course the answer to her question is yes, we absolutely spend more time talking about innovation than actually innovating because talk is easy and fun and safe and social. Change isn't easy and people don't like it; in fact, they go to great lengths to avoid it. Talking requires no follow-through, no shifting of priorities or increased workload.

Here's a thought: how much would people still want to have the innovation conversation if it meant that their jobs would be jeopardized or changed? Not to play devil's advocate or anything, but that's what this month is for, right? But what if change meant personal unrest for us in the form of a salary cut or a slash in title or just plain old job elimination? Would we still be as enthusiastic? Because really, if you're going to sign up for changing the game, part of what you're signing up for is that the whole game--including your role--could be forever altered. Would--I suppose, if you're doing it right--definitely be altered.

I guess it's kind of like asking "would you be wiling to die for your country"...and also kind of a rhetorical question because, as much as we all love our associations, I doubt many of us are that altruistic that we'd be willing to forsake our paychecks for the sake of innovation. Or am I wrong--would you?

More Traditional Gender Bias in New Media

There is a theme in my universe today and it is that women are apparently pretty much permanently screwed when it comes to equality. Why else would these two items come up nearly back-to-back on Twitter?

• New Media Embraces Old Media's Male-Centricity
• Why James Chartrand Wears Women’s Underpants

I've already blogged about the gender gap in social media salaries, and constantly come across articles about women being under-represented or under-something-ed...to see these two items back to back today just made me pause and think "this is never going to change."

I mean, seriously--on one hand the world is telling us that there is no force more powerful than a legion of mommy bloggers...but when you come right down to it, how much of that actually translates to earning power or professional influence for women in new careers like blogging or community management?

What if associations required every staffer to work at ANOTHER association for 3 days?

Ok, I've procrastinated long enough: time to get my head together and try to add to the incredible discussions initiated by Acronym's Big Ideas Series. I won't even try to link to all the posts from here because I'll inevitably leave some out; Acronym is doing a great job of keeping track of the posts and I encourage you to read back over the past few weeks' archives and check out all the great posts if you haven't already been following along.

It's funny because even though I contributed several of the original questions, unless I'm having a brain malfunction (entirely possible) I don't think this was one of them; however, it's ultimately the one that stands out the most to me now. I think that having the experience of working at a number of different associations is critical to truly understanding the underlying principles of association leadership. To me, learning by doing is the most effective way to learn. Granted, I'm not sure if that's just because I'm lazy and hate studying or because it's actually true...regardless, I can say that everything I know about associations and association leadership is a result of knowledge gained on the job.

I have worked at four very different associations over the course of my career: the U.S. Council for Energy Awareness (USCEA) (now Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI)), American Forest & Paper Association (AF&PA), American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (A.S.P.E.N) and American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). Working at such a wide variety of associations--different sizes, different industries, different staff cultures--has given me a true appreciation of how associations work, a tremendous amount of respect for small staff associations, and what I think is a good perspective on what members expect and deserve.

I have not only worked in a bunch of very different associations, I have served in a bunch of very different capacities in each of these associations--something which I think is equally important in terms of giving a good idea of the work of individual associations. I have done darn near everything, from preparing daily newsclips packages and serving coffee at meetings to planning and running large annual meetings; administering peer-review journals and editing galleys to participating in board meetings--you name it and I've probably either done it or worked closely with people who have done it and therefore at least understand the amount of work that goes into each facet of an association's work.

Sorry...forgive my wander down memory lane...back to the question of what if associations required every staffer to work in another association for 3 days...here are my ideas:

1. People would have a better understanding and appreciation for their own associations. Say you work at a large-staff association and had to go work at a small association. You'd no doubt return to your own chair with a new appreciation for how easy you have it in some respects. If you work for a small association, you'd probably return to your chair with a new appreciation for the fact that, while your job may be harder in some respects, you have a unique opportunity to really learn how about the inner workings of association leadership by virtue of your staff's small size.


2. People would learn some really cool stuff. One of the coolest things about associations is the stuff you learn when you work at one--stuff you'd otherwise have probably never known. Like what? Well, like when I worked at USCEA and learned that when The Simpsons first aired, the media relations staff there didn't love all the jokes about 3-eyed fish and nuclear plant operators falling asleep at the controls, so they invited the show's writers to take a tour of a nuclear power plant--which they did (not that it stopped the 3-eyed fish thing any, but apparently it was very entertaining being able to spend the day with a bunch of Simpsons writers.) Ok, so maybe that's kind of random and not a great illustration of my point (no pun intended)...my point was that associations do millions of cool things and there's no better way to find that out than to get a chance to experience the behind-the-scenes stuff at as many of them as possible. Think of it as a personal "Power of A" quest.


3. People would gain a new appreciation for their members and volunteers. I am nothing short of amazed and humbled by the amount of time and personal sacrifice volunteers commit to their associations. The more times over you get to experience this in the context of different associations, the more appreciation you have for your own role as a facilitator of the contributions their collective knowledge and dedication offer society as a whole. Shmaltzy? Maybe. But true.

I Can Only Imagine How Tiger Woods Feels...and Why I'm Going Back To ASHA

I do not envy Tiger Woods right now. I can only imagine how it must feel to be a public figure and have your personal life exposed for the world's comment. Ok, granted the guy is a celebrity and the stakes of his indiscretions are high: so far he's already lost Gatorade as a sponsor--who knows if others (Nike?) will follow.

Granted, there's is no comparison between a huge celebrity like Tiger Woods and a lowly community manager like myself...other than we both have some 'splainin' to do, as Ricky Ricardo would say. No, I was not unfaithful to my adorable husband or anything sordid like that...but I did just a few weeks ago make a prominent-ish job change, only to now be going back to my former job. Yes, that's right--I am going back to the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) to resume my role (albeit slightly modified) as social media & community specialist after a brief foray at Avectra.

If I learned anything from this Tiger Woods nightmare it's that you may as well just tell your story and be done with it--even if your story isn't that interesting. The association world is small and only days after an article in Associations Now profiling me as one of the first full-time association community managers hit people's mailboxes, I announced that I was leaving to go to Avectra, an association management software company. And here it is not even a month later and I'm going back to ASHA. What gives?

Nothing as interesting as Tiger's story, I assure you. Basically two things: balancing work and parenting is hard and I'm a quick learner. While my boss at Avectra could not be a nicer or more accommodating person, it quickly became apparent that trying to balance parenting and a killer commute during flu season is no small feat. That and it took me all of a few weeks to realize that I missed the member community I had played a part in building. I didn't realize the full magnitude of my pride in being part of something until I was no longer part of it. Shortly after I left ASHA, they had their annual meeting and I was able to watch the fruits of my labor in action: an active twitterstream during convention, lots of posts on Facebook about the event, and members who still thought I was at ASHA tweeting me links to their blog posts and talking about how important the association's social media activities were to them. It's one thing to preach how important social media is to people; it's another to hear from them how much they appreciate your efforts and how it's enhancing their professional lives and their association memberships. Suddenly instead of me pushing my ideas about community I was watching members suggesting stuff like a session dedicated to social media at next year's meeting, or establishing their own hashtag for feedback about the conference. Maybe it sounds stupid, but I felt proud...and sad not to be a part of it anymore.

I figured if I already felt this way after being out of the association world for only 3 weeks, maybe the association world was where I belong. Maybe my work wasn't done yet. So I swallowed my pride, gave my apologies to Avectra and asked for my old job back. Luckily they hadn't filled the position yet, and welcomed me back.

So there you have it...honestly, not that interesting, but writing this will hopefully save me the trouble of repeating this story a million times when I start changing my job status in various social networks over the next week or so. It was an honor to work with Avectra, if only for a few short weeks--if you're in the association world and don't already subscribe to their Avectra Academy newsletters and webinar series, you should--they've got some really great content and plans to do some great things.

One Prediction and Three Actions for 2010

I just read Amber Naslund's post in which she forgoes predictions for 2010 in favor of planning some actions for the coming year. Rather than write a huge long comment on her post I figured I'd just write a post about it myself with a big hat-tip to her for inspiring me. I LOVE the idea of actions instead of predictions for several reasons. First, because reading predictions gets tiresome. Now there are approximately a bazillion "social media gurus" out there and each and every one is bound to do their own predictions post, and those predictions are likely to all look pretty similar. Namely:

• There will be a huge glut in hiring for social media jobs--because there already is one.


• Facebook and Twitter will continue to grow in popularity--duh.


• "Mobile" and "augmented reality" will be big buzzwords--because they already are.

And so on...

So me writing a post expanding on those same ideas wouldn't be very interesting, would it?

Therefore I will just add one prediction then use Amber's post as what will hopefully be the beginning of a more interesting meme--come up with a few things that I plan to do differently in 2010.

My prediction:

It will become too crowded in the social media space and mass chaos and bad blood within the space will ensue. Ok, I admit that's not really a prediction because it's already happening...but I predict it will continue to get worse. And hopefully peak and start to evolve into a space that is less about rockstars and unknowns and more about lots of different levels of specialization where people will begin finding their niches and settling in. Because there are so many facets to social media and, other than the tools, most really don't have too much in common with each other. For instance: social media marketing to boost revenue and social networking for the sake of information sharing, advancing ideas and fostering relationships. Same tools, very different methods and outcomes. One person's dream "social media" job is probably very different from another's.

Ok, for actions, here are 3...I could have kept going but I'm limiting to 3 in hopes people might actually read them.

1. Make peace with the notion that if everyone doesn't buy into social media, the world won't end. David Gammel wrote a great post that inspired this epiphany--not that he's the first to ever say those things but after letting his post sink in for a few weeks, somehow it just resonated with me. He says in his post
   

   Here’s another thing: you don’t need everyone to ‘get it.’

   
   And you know what? He's totally right. I admit to being more of the mindset that everyone DID need to get it and it was MY JOB to show them the light. Now, after some cool conversations about this and some time to ruminate on David's post, I realize that what's important to me is helping people who want help find the best tools and strategy to achieve their goals. Not converting each and every person to a social media believer.


2. Help bring clarity to the issues of social media titles and salaries. I've said it before and I'll say it again--I'm somewhat obsessed with this issue because it drives me crazy that there is such a lack of benchmarks in the social media job sphere. Titles, salaries...you've got everything from VP to director to manager to unpaid intern, all with some degree of overlapping roles and with salaries all over the map. As if the confusion wasn't bad enough just for the sake of making it hard to know if you're being compensated fairly in your social media role, a recent report revealed that there is a growing disparity in social media salaries based on gender. There are enough areas in life where women are valued less than men; to have this be the case in the social media sphere too is just too much. There are so, so many amazing, smart thought leaders in this space who are female--it is NOT OK that we let ourselves be marginalized in a sphere that we dominate. My association-world friend (I can say friend now that we met in real life, right?) Ben Martin is doing a social media salary survey and I'm going to do my best to help him collect as much data as possible, because the more concrete data there is about social media roles and salaries, the harder it will be to keep disturbing trends like women being paid less than they're worth under the carpet. I know there is lots of interest in this subject because more and more of my blog traffic is coming from searches for "social media salaries"--so if you've landed on this post as a result of such a query, go check out Ben's social media salary survey.


3. Use my powers for good. Ok, with fewer than 200 subscribers, I'm certainly no Dooce and, consequently, probably won't be getting luxury appliance manufacturers to donate stuff to women's shelters by virtue of my influence. However, I do want to put my money where my mouth is and use my knowledge of social media to promote causes I feel are worthy. Therefore, in 2010 I'm going to try to spread the word about an organization I feel is doing important work: the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI). No, they are not paying me; they don't know who I am, other than a member who receives their newsletter and Friday updates, and who follows them on Twitter. Don't worry--I won't be getting too TMI on this blog, but plan to do more blogging on my other blog about de-stigmatizing mental illness. So if you're a fan of the TMI side of me, feel free to check out my personal blog.

Ok, now would usually be the time I tag a few people to see if I can get them to do their own actions for 2010 posts, but because the holidays are a busy time for everyone, I will spare people the burden of feeling they need to post about this--but if you want to, by all means, go for it and feel free to leave a link to your post in the comments of this post.

Your Social Media Failure is Not Because Social Networks Are Too Crowded

I read this article yesterday and am still shaking my head about it today. The article's premise--"Governments Tweet, Few Care"--is based in part on one guy's opinion that government is boring and people only seek excitement and entertainment on social networks. The article goes on to state that this guy "does not use social-networking sites." Why are they interviewing him, then, about using social media for government?

Then they tell how the guy from a local ad/PR agency explains that Twitter and Facebook aren't great online networking sites for business and government because people are there for entertainment, not work. Oh, really? Or could it possibly be that his agency doesn't know how to design an effective, engaging social media strategy?

THEN they quote another local public information officer who declares matter-of-factly that social sites really only reach niche markets and staff time is "best invested in traditional media." Yeah, Facebook clearly only reaches niche markets with its 350 million active monthly users. That's some niche.

I don't mean to sound like a hater, but let's call a spade a spade: many businesses are having a lot of success using Facebook and Twitter for business. Don't assume that it's not even worth trying based on articles like this one. Yes, it's crowded out there--but that just means there are that many more people you can potentially reach with a well thought-out and orchestrated social media strategy.