Janet Lee Johnson | The Art of Marketing

It was August of last year when my lovely introduced me to Pinterest. People who are new to it keep saying they get ‘lost’ easily in Pinterest. Ms. M described it exactly so when she told me about it.

I’ve started using it to collect infographics, and searching for phrases like “beauty” and “light.” It’s a wonderful new way to mine the collective consciousness while feeding the right side of the brain. And I’ve really enjoyed seeing more people adopt it recently.

As a result of all the new users, I’ve also been fascinated by the torrent of recent press about it. Turns out 80% Pinterest users are women. And on the other hand, 80% of Google+ users are men. (More about Google+ soon.)

This Atlantic Wire article stopped me in my tracks though. The Army as a poster Pinterest user? At the bottom of the page is a Slideshare presentation on how the US Army describes Pinterest to their communications teams.

As a big bonus, they describe very succinctly how it works.

In an article yesterday, AdAge talked about the struggle of marrying social media and Customer Relations Management (CRM) systems. There’s no doubt the technology is there, and social media feeds can easily be linked to individualrecords in CRM systems (like Salesforce.com). The marketer’s struggle is pretty much a visualization exercise, in my book. Plus, few marketers “speak IT.” But more and more, IT teams and marketers have a common language - largely linked through well-implemented CRM systems.

So, to visualize just a little:

Fabulous post from long-time (12 years!) blogger Anil Dash - talking about social responsibility in a new way.

New information from IDC on the sheer growth of data - digital data is 10x what it was five years ago - and zettabytes are the new exabytes!

Meanwhile, people wonder why we’re tired by the end of a day.

On the other hand, there’s never a dull moment, if you like this kind of thing.

(and I do.)

If you want to see a great chronicle of the power of a post or a Tweet, check out how quickly this little mention from @amberkarnes - in defense of artist Stevie on the etsy site tru.che, vs. Urban Outfitters - played out.

Amber has about 1900 followers on Twitter, and blogs over at “my aim is true.”

Her post called “Anatomy of a trending topic: how Twitter and the crafting community put the smackdown on Urban Outfitters” today walks everyone through the incredibly rapid response to her Tweet, visually.

Every marketer should have a look at Amber’s Anatomy post. It should give you both a speedy chronology of a mini-revolt, and some sage advice… I love her attitude as she starts the post:

“Today has been a fun ride. Behold the power of social media muscle.

This morning, online buddy Gayla Trail (also known as You Grow Girl) posted a link to her Facebook page. It was to atumblr post by Chicago independent jewelry artist Stevie of tru.che….”

BTW, Urban Outfitters got hammered on its Facebook page… this is a tame one:

…and has posted a single Tweet in response so far. Urban Outfitters is probably really happy we’re into a three-day weekend.

I’m pretty sure we’ll hear more about this, in spite of that.

Janus, according to wikipedia, is the Roman god of beginnings and “transitions.”

“thence also of gates, doors, doorways, endings and time. Most often he is depicted as having two heads, facing opposite directions: one head looks eastward and the other westward. Symbolically they look simultaneously into the future and the past, back at the last year and forward at the new.”

I thought of Janus when I reviewed this infographic from onlineeducation.net about the effects of social media on students.

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The “inconclusive” nature of this beast is frustrating to me. However gloriously depicted. And I have always enjoyed seeing both sides of an argument… Hence, my affinity to Janus in this case.

The door is certainly open. The journey is up to the person.