Social Media Experts | Professional Blog Service

Time to Stop Misapplying the 10,000 Hour Rule

Monday, April 5th, 2010

I’ve been thinking about the whole “it takes 10,000 hours to be an expert” thing, and I’ve come to one conclusion:

Most people are getting it wrong.

If you’re quoting it at me, especially in terms of business or technology, you’re taking it out of context.

The 10,000 hour rule comes from Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Outliers (affiliate link). The rule applies to people who have reached extraordinary success in their chosen field, whether it’s football, golf, chess, violin, hockey, computers, etc.

It’s about people who stand out as the best of the best, because they spent 10,000 hours practicing their skills, while the “still pretty damn good” crowd only spent 8,000 hours.

Here’s where people get it wrong: Gladwell did not say that if you want to be good, if you want to be an expert, at something, you have to spend 10,000 hours doing it (which is about 4 hours a day, every day, for almost 7 years).

But people continually misquote the rule (mostly because they haven’t read the book), and then misapply it to the use of tools.

“If you haven’t used these tools for 10,000 hours, then you can’t call yourself an expert,” they say.

That’s what is commonly known in the business world as “a load of crap.”

Tying expertise into time spent using a tool is just plain stupid. If I want an expert carpenter to build a deck for my house, I’m not looking for a guy who has spent 10,000 hours swinging a hammer. I want a guy who has spent 10,000 hours building things.

If a contractor has spent 10,000 hours swinging a hammer, but can’t measure and cut to save his life, then I don’t want him. If he doesn’t know to use treated lumber, or that we need concrete pilings below the frost line, which is ~~42″~~ 36″ in Central Indiana, then I don’t want him. If he’s an expert at using a tool, but can’t see the bigger picture, he’s the wrong guy to build my deck. (Update: The frost line is 36″ in Indiana. Thanks to Chris for pointing out the error.)

I’d rather have the guy who has spent a lot of time building things, whether it’s decks, houses, barns, or pergolas. That’s someone who knows how to use the tools he’s got. He’s not an expert at pounding nails, he’s an expert at creating. He knows the material, he knows joinery technique, he knows which fasteners work best. The tools don’t matter — he could use a hammer and a hand saw, or a nail gun and a chop saw — it’s what he builds with them that matters.

The same is true in the business setting. The expert is not someone who has spent 10,000 hours using a particular tool or a piece of software. The expert is someone who knows their subject matter, knows how to use it to their customers’ advantage, and and can properly use the tools to create something great with them.

The expert is the person who can use their skills and knowledge to make a profitable and successful business. They write books. They give talks. They are paid to apply their skills and knowledge. They are not experts because they spent 5 – 10 years using a particular piece of software. They’re experts because they know how to do great things with it, even if they’ve only used it for a year.

It’s time to stop labeling people as experts or non-experts through the misapplication of some misquoted rule meant only to apply to the astonishingly-skilled in a specialized field. It’s time to look at a person’s results and successes, not a time card.

Photo credit: Simpologist (Flickr)

About the Author: Erik Deckers
Erik is the VP of Operations & Creative Services for Pro Blog Service. He has been blogging since 1998, and has been a published writer for more than 22 years. He has written humor newspaper columns, business articles, radio and stage plays, and is currently working on a novel. He helped write Twitter Marketing for Dummies, and is writing two other books on social media and networking. Erik frequently speaks on blogging and social media.

Tags: 10K hour rule, experts, Malcolm Gladwell, social media experts
Posted in Communication, Social Media, Writing | View Comments

Making the Argument for Ghost Blogging. Yet Again.

Tuesday, November 10th, 2009

My good friend Lindsay Manfredi and I were both interviewed about ghost blogging last week, and asked whether we thought it carried any ethical dilemmas.

The answer is no, it doesn’t. Not if it’s done correctly.

I’ve talked about ghost blogging before, and said if it follows a few basic procedures, it’s as ethical as, say, public relations. (Er, on second thought. . . )

Yet, the issue keeps getting brought up, as if we’re committing some unpardonable ethical sin, like medical testing on baby seals. But the only people who seem to care are social media purists and “social media ninjas” who talk about transparency, yet work in industries where their efforts, if done correctly, are anonymous and behind the scenes as well.

Ghostwriting = copywriting

Anyone who does freelance copywriting can tell you that their name doesn’t go on squat when it comes to their efforts. Sales brochures, web copy, sales letters, speeches, you name it, the writer’s name is not-so-noticeably absent from the final copy. And that’s fine. That’s the life we choose.

Marketing agencies don’t get their names on their clients’ campaigns. No one whines that “my name isn’t on that sales brochure I wrote” or “my name isn’t in the newspaper article I sent the press release about.” Frankly, if you’re worried about getting credit for your work, you’re in the wrong business. If you want a byline, be a journalist.

Maintaining Ethical Boundaries for Ghost Blogging

A good ghost has procedures they follow with their clients:

I interview the client, who tells me — in his own words — his thoughts about their industry-specific issues.
I transcribe the interview and clean it up, turning it into 350 – 450 words of clear, informative copy.
The client approves the article.
I publish the article on their blog.

It’s the clients thoughts, the client’s words. I just transcribe it. Or as we like to say, “we do the work so you can go to your meetings.”

How is this any different from the CEO’s letter at the front of the company’s annual report? Or a politician’s speech to her constituents? Or the catalog copy that was supposedly written by the company’s founder? How is it any different from a PR flak’s press release that becomes the basis for a news article? (I say this as a former flak whose press releases were often turned into “Staff Wire Reports” by one county newspaper.)

Answer: It isn’t. Not a bit. They are exactly the same thing. (In fact, Jason Falls says that we’re not ghostwriters, we’re copywriters, and that it’s okay.)

These are the same steps that every other copywriter, speechwriter, and marketing director in the world follows when they produce work for a client. This has been an acceptable practice since well before Judson Welliver ghosted for Warren G. Harding, thus becoming the first presidential speechwriter.

The only place ghostwriting isn’t acceptable is journalism and academia, as it should be. Your merit is based on the work you produce; in business, it’s based on the results you achieve. (Although academia seems to have some of its own ghostwriting issues.)

So if you are against ghost blogging, you need to be against all ghostwriting. You need to speak out against speechwriters for politicians. You need to put an end to all freelance copywriting. You need to stop sending out press releases that don’t include your name as a quoted source.

Otherwise, it’s a non-issue. The people who hire me are the ones I’m concerned with. The social media purists? Well, you just give me something to blog about, thus boosting my own search engine rankings.

So, thanks for that.

Tags: blogging, ghostwriting, Social Media, social media experts
Posted in Blogging, Business Blogging Content, Communication, Ghost Writing, Writing | View Comments

Rethinking Social Media Experts

Monday, August 24th, 2009

(Originally posted on DeckersMarketing.com on August 17, 2009.)

A few days ago, I wrote that we need to rethink this whole “there’s no such thing as social media experts” nonsense.

The argument, as stated by some non-social media people, is something to the effect of:

Malcolm Gladwell says you have to do something for 10,000 hours to be an expert.
Social media tools like Twitter are not 10,000 hours old.
You can’t have used Twitter for 10,000 hours.
Therefore, there are no social media experts.

This is utter bullshit.

Most of the NSME (“no social media experts”) crowd seem to think it’s the use, knowledge, and experience of the tools that make one an expert. The tools are not important. The tools are just tools. Real expertise lies in two other areas: message creation and social psychology. That is, what to say, and how it will affect your chosen audience/group.

(Big thanks to my friend Lalita Amos, author of the now-famous N-Word Manifesto, for helping me come up with this idea. A never-long-enough meeting with her launched my brain in this direction. She deserves the credit for pushing it off that way.)

Speak to the dog, in the language of the dog, about things that matter to the heart of the dog.

Marketing relies strongly on those other two areas. The true social media experts are actually reformed marketers and PR pros. They’re Message Experts. They know how to create strong messages, and they know how those messages affect their targeted groups. They’re not tool experts. They’re not necessarily experts at graphic design, TV and radio production, or website creation. They hire the people who are. They focus strictly on making the best possible message.

Similarly, they’re Social Psychology experts. They know how a message will affect their target audience, and how and when to change the message for a different audience. They know they can’t just throw a message out there and hope for the best. They can, as I like to say, speak to the dog, in the language of the dog, about things that matter to the heart of the dog. The good marketer/PR pro speaks Dog. They may not be a dog, but they speak it as a second language.

The Tools Don’t Make the Carpenter

Norm Abram, the master carpenter on PBS’ New Yankee Workshop and This Old House, learned how to build houses and woodworking projects from his dad. Norm is old enough that his father taught him these skills on hand tools. Norm’s dad built houses using a hammer, hand saws, drills, and block planes. So Norm learned how to use these tools.

However, as Norm got older, he began to use power tools. Now, on his show, he has about 10 routers, multiple power drills, and enough nail guns to start a war with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. His dad, on the other hand, never made that jump, until after he retired.

One time when his dad was visiting for several days, Norm taught his dad how to use the tools.. He had never used routers or table saws before, so this was a brand new experience for him. But after a few days, he was up to speed on these new tools, and was creating projects with the same quality and skill he had been doing with block planes and hand saws.

According to the NSME crowd, Norm’s dad would no longer have been an expert, because he hadn’t spent 10,000 hours using those tools, as if all the knowledge had flown out of his head.

However, it wasn’t the knowledge of these new tools that made Norm’s dad a master carpenter, it was the knowledge of how to make straight cuts and fasten pieces of wood together. For his dad, it was the decades of knowledge of joinery techniques (message) and how to assemble the wood into functional pieces of furniture that would be appealing to people (social psychology).

Those Who Can’t Do, Coach

Gladwell’s 10,000 hour rule is about people who have a freakish level of mastery of their chosen skill. They’re the Peyton Mannings, Michael Jordans, and Tiger Woods of the world. They have a level of expertise in all three circles. They’ve got expertise in the tools, the “message,” and the “social psychology.”

Peyton Manning has the tools, the message, and the social psychology. He’s 6’4″ with the laser rocket arm, he has a mastery of all the plays in the playbooks, and knows how other teams will react to the plays they will run (he does this by studying game film with an almost compulsive obsession. So Peyton Manning is obviously a 10,000 hour expert.

But what about Clyde Christensen? He’s the new offensive coordinator for the Indianapolis Colts. Clyde has never played professional football (he was a QB at North Carolina University), but he has been a coach since 1979. He doesn’t have the same tools as our laser-rocket-armed quarterback, but he knows as much about the plays and what the other teams are going to do. Similarly, Larry Coyer, the Colts’ defensive coordinator, knows what his defense needs to do when the other teams look like they’re going to run certain plays.

Neither of them have the tools that their players do, or if they did, they don’t anymore. But they’re masters of the other two.

That’s where the real expertise lies. Not in the tools, but in the knowledge of the other two areas.

For the real social media experts, and there are more of those than the social media haters realize, we know about proper messaging, and we know how to package that message to our different target audiences. The tools we use just make our lives easier.

Five years ago, we had to communicate with websites and emails. Fifteen years ago, we communicated with TV and radio commercials. Twenty years ago, we communicated with newspaper ads. And while we had experts in creating content for those tools, the important knowledge — messaging and psychology — has remained the same.

Until the tools become so wildly different that messaging and social psychology has to change with it, we need to accept the fact that there are real social media experts in the world, and we know what we’re talking about.

Tags: Malcolm Gladwell, Social Media, social media experts
Posted in Social Media, Social Networks, Tools, Twitter | View Comments

Yes Virginia, There Are Social Media EXPERTS

Thursday, August 20th, 2009

(Originally published on DeckersMarketing.com on August 14, 2009)

I’ve been thinking about the whole “there’s no such thing as social media experts” argument lately.

I’ve decided it’s wrong.

We’ve heard this “no such thing” argument from a lot of people, including me, who all sound like a bunch of 8-year-olds fighting on the playground.

“Nuh-uh! Social media isn’t even 10,000 hours old. Malcolm Gladwell says you have to have 10,000 hours of experience to be an expert!”

Fair enough. Malcolm Gladwell’s idea that if you want to have a true mastery of a skill, you need 10,000 hours of work, practice, and study in that field.

However, keep in mind that this is to be a superstar in your field. The Michael Jordans, the Peyton Mannings, the Tiger Woods. If you want to be that good, then yes, you have to have 10,000 hours or more of practice.

But what about to be just “decent?” To be better than most? You don’t have to be better than everyone, you just have to be better than your clients, your colleagues, or the people who just invited you to speak to their trade association for a few thousand bucks. (Do you really want to tell those guys you’re not really an expert?)

Think about it. Do you truly have 10,000 hours of experience in your chosen field? If you’re a public speaker, have you given 10,000 1-hour speeches? If you’re in public relations and you consider yourself a good press release writer, have you truly written press releases for 10,000 hours? And how many years would it take to rack up 10,000 hours of experience as a professional photographer? (Measure it in 1/60th of a second increments.)

Let’s face it, there aren’t that many experts in any field. The 10,000 hour commandment we’ve all accepted as gospel from St. Malcolm is not appropriate for us.

My friend Doug Karr decided it was a load of bullshit last month, and has a new definition for an expert.

Peter Shankman has a big list about ways to tell if your social media expert is not really an expert. (My favorite: 5. Everything they learned about social media they learned by reading blog posts (i.e. no application). You can learn a ton about sex from reading Kinsey’s manuals, but I’d still rather be with someone who has some practical experience.

So I think we need a new standard when calling ourselves an expert, whether it’s social media, public relations, photographer, etc. And it’s a simple, 4-question survey. If you can answer yes to all four of these questions, you’re an expert. If you can’t, well, then get back to work until you can.

Do you know more about your tool/method/equipment than most people? Would you be graded on the 90th percentile or even 95th percentile in terms of knowledge?
Can you speak intelligently about the application and usage of that tool/method/equipment? Are you asked to give presentations and/or teach others about it?
Have you written extensively about that tool/method/equipment? Have you published articles, blog posts, or even books on the subject? Do you have an extensive body of work that demonstrates your knowledge?
Are you generally recognized by your peers as having some authority and credibility in this subject? Does your name come up frequently when someone asks, “who knows a lot about ?”

If you can’t answer yes to these questions, it doesn’t matter how many hours you’ve spent on that subject. I can think of six people who I would gladly hang the label “social media expert” on, because they can answer “hell, yes!” to each of these questions.

To the people who put “social media expert” in the same “no such thing” camp as Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster, get over yourselves. Just because no one is recognizing you as an expert doesn’t mean you have to get all snarky about the ones who really are.

I’m with you when it comes to booting out the so-called experts who have only been using Facebook for six months, and that’s to play Pirate Clan. But when you’ve got people who are truly well-versed on the tools, don’t give me this “10,000 hour” bullshit when it just doesn’t apply in this case.

It doesn’t matter if these tools are less than five years old. It’s not the tool that matters. The tool is useless and pointless, and it doesn’t make you an expert.

Knowing what messages to send and how your message and those tools will affect a group (social psychology) is where the expertise lies. In a few days, I’ll be writing about how knowing how to use the tools is not nearly as important as knowing what messages to send and the social psychology of a group is where the true expertise lies.

Tags: Doug Karr, Malcolm Gladwell, Social Media, social media experts, social networking
Posted in Business Blogging Content, Opinion, Social Media, Social Networks | View Comments

Why You Shouldn’t Hire Social Media EXPERTS

Wednesday, July 15th, 2009

We wrote about the problem with people calling themselves social media experts a few months ago, saying there basically aren’t any. We figured this was just some little topic of discussion we had going on around town that would have died off pretty quickly, but it’s still going on, and there are a few more people talking about the same thing.

(We don’t think we started it though.)

Now, Doug Karr is putting a new spin on the “there are no social media experts” argument, saying there are a few, and he’s one of them. (We agree. He’s one of the few we gladly hang the “expert” moniker on.)

Doug says:

I call myself an expert for three reasons:

1. Businesses seek experts, not gurus and geeks.
2. Calling myself an expert holds me to a higher standard and expectation with a company that I must fulfill.
3. I fit the definition:

An expert is someone widely recognized as a reliable source of technique or skill whose faculty for judging or deciding rightly, justly, or wisely is accorded authority and status by their peers or the public in a specific well distinguished domain. An expert, more generally, is a person with extensive knowledge or ability in a particular area of study.

Peter Shankman of Help A Reporter Out fame has come up with a rather extensive list of things to watch out for when hiring a social media expert:

3. They “discovered” social media in the last six to 16 months, and there’s nothing online from them in the social media space prior to that. (Remember – Google is your friend.)

4. All of a firm or agency’s “social media strategists” come from traditional PR or Marketing agencies.

5. Everything they learned about social media they learned by reading blog posts (i.e. no application). You can learn a ton about sex from reading Kinsey’s manuals, but I’d still rather be with someone who has some practical experience.

In short, it takes a big set of. . . experiences to call oneself an expert in an industry that’s not old enough to have any true experts. If we use the Malcolm Gladwell definition of 10,000+ hours, then most people will fail in this definition. The problem is we get people who have used the technology — usually Facebook and Twitter — for a few months, and think they know enough to be an expert.

The problem is, your average high school student has logged more hours on Facebook and the like, and thus “knows more” than the so-called experts.

However, I’ll accept people using the term “expert” in a few exceptions:

The person helped to actually create the tools like Twitter and Facebook (i.e. Biz Stone and Mark Zuckerberg).
The person is a developer or programmer for those tools, because in order to write for it, you have to have a deep understanding of how it works. Someone like Doug Karr, basically.
Someone who can show several measurable successes with the tools. Have they done campaigns before? How did they do? How did they do it? They should be able to show it, explain it, and replicate it.
Someone who knows more than most people. Now, this one violates the 10,000 Hour Rule, because it’s possible to know more than most, but only have a few thousand hours of experience. The term expert is relative, because there will be someone with more experience than you, but it’s a place to start.
They understand that social media is just another tool in the marketing toolbox. They should understand the psychology and marketing behind successful social media campaigns, not just which buttons to click. They should be able to integrate social media into an overall PR or marketing campaign, rather than declare that Twitter is the be all and end all of the campaign.

Graphic credit: Arbenting

Tags: Social Media, social media experts, social networking
Posted in Opinion, Social Media, Social Networks, Twitter | View Comments

Blogs are the Center of the Universe

Wednesday, April 29th, 2009

I love social media experts. There’s one born exactly every 0.017 seconds, and they all have great opinions that prove Dirty Harry’s second most famous quote right. One piece of advice they like to give is:

“You should not blog, at least not right away.”

Take it from a social media practitioner (I’m not a “social media expert” that is a title for an “interactive user” who has hung out a shingle), blogs are important. In fact, blogs are the center of the social media universe. Why?

Blogs are the root source of content for nearly everything.

If you plan on doing anything meaningful in social media, you have to have a landing point. Preferably one you can measure and is engaging. Often times you need a place to break a story. Other times you need somewhere you can bring together ideas. Blogs are perfect for this.

About the Author: Mike Seidle
Mike Seidle is a leading Internet marketing strategist and has been helping companies with search engine optimization and developing cost effective Internet marketing strategies since 1998. Mike is a one of the founders of Professional Blog Service and currently serves on Professional Blog Service's board of directors.

Tags: blogs, Social Media, social media experts, twitter
Posted in All Posts, Blog ROI, Blogging, Business Blogging Content, Social Media, Social Networks, Twitter | View Comments

Hey, Social Media Experts – Get a JOB

Tuesday, March 24th, 2009

There are a lot of people betting their careers on social media. They’re granting themselves fancy titles like social media expert, social marketing gurus, or social media optimizers. SMEs and SMOs. Here’s some stark advice to most of these so-called experts.

Give up while you can.

I’m not trying to be a jerk or to get rid of the competition. I’m pointing out a reality. The career choice of most social media experts is going to be short-lived. Why? because, there’s only so much they can contribute.

Let Me Explain

Anything that you can know well enough to be an expert at in 1,000 hours or less is simply not worth pursuing as a career. For those counting, that’s the equivalent of about one year of school. That’s not very deep. In fact, most of the intern level people I interview have at least 2,000 hours of MySpace, Facebook and LinkedIn experience under their belt just from being in school and looking for a job. That makes most recent high school graduates bona fide social media experts (not like this guy).

Would you entrust your corporate social media campaign to an 18-year-old? Didn’t think so.

You Can’t Hire the Real Thought Leaders

For those looking at social media in a PR, marketing or brand monitoring role, here’s some advice: look for people who can get things done, and shy away from “thought leaders.” Why? Because the self-proclaimed social media experts are not the real thought leaders. The real thought leaders in social media have names like Mark Zuckerberg (creator of Facebook), Evan Williams (founder of Blogger and Twitter), and Reid Hoffman (of LinkedIn fame).

With all due respect to our local social media experts (including us), guys like Evan Williams clearly are not the ones that are showing up, hat in hand, to sell you that blogging boot camp or the “how to use” LinkedIn consulting. They’re a little busy changing the world at the moment. If a person calls themselves a thought leader, they either really are, or they have a lot of time on their hands to do lots of thinking and not a lot of working.

Here’s the second issue with most SMEs: They know enough to be able to help the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker. They generally can help small business find local customers on Twitter and even set up effective profiles on Facebook or LinkedIn. But that’s about it.

But larger corporations need to move beyond the local push. They need to reach people in their industry or demographic profile. They need to be able to measure the ROI of their efforts. They need to know immediately when one tweak or tiny misstep could result in a half-point shift in their market share, because that could translate into millions of dollars.

Your run-of-the-mill SME doesn’t have the skills, tools, or wherewithal to handle that. PR professionals and marketing companies with a part-time social media intern aren’t going to be able to turn on a dime like that.

There’s a lot more to social media than setting up a couple of profiles, tossing up a blog, and twittering. You need to strategize, develop an entire campaign, and then be able to measure the results. (Hey, even TV advertising and PR can’t adequately measure their results.)

Work With a Team Instead of a Talking Head

If you should shy away from the SMEs, then who should you trust? Social media agencies. Why? Because most social media agencies have been busy working instead of talking. Nothing is new to them (blogs have been around since the 90s, MySpace started in 2000). They’re not distracted by the latest shiny object or hopping on the latest craze. And they’re able to pull from an entire staff of experts, not just whatever they read on Search Engine Watch last week.

Most of us agency types see social media for what it is: a lot of work, that, if done right, has a high return on investment. We see it as a component of a larger program, be it advertising, public relations, marketing, or even creating shifts in public opinion. And we’ve got years of experience in advertising, public relations, marketing, and creating shifts in public opinion.

The question corporations should be asking of your social media partner is simple: “Can you get us where we need to go?”

That means a lot more than, “Can you create a YouNoodle profile for my new startup?” (And if they say, “huh?”, you don’t want them anyway).

It means, “Have you ever run an online grass roots campaign before?”

It means, “Do you know how to build a reader base for my blog?”

It means, “Do you actually have a clue about marketing, sales and PR that extends beyond Twitter?”

It also means, “Do you have the right capabilities to help us get this done?” More often than not, that last question is the show stopper for SMEs. Social media is a lot of work and often is too much work for a do-it-yourself approach, especially if they have more than one client. Because this job is more than just “First, you need a Facebook page.” And if that’s all an SME is telling you, run away. Very fast.

In short, many social media initiatives fail because they’re a lot more work than anyone expected. Especially the expert.

So if you’re one of those newly-minted SMEs, ask yourself: do you have the knowledge, experience, and tools to create a professional campaign that meets your client’s expectations? Are you willing to put in the hours and hours beyond a Twitter profile? Or are you going to risk your client’s money and your professional reputation to find out the hard way that you can’t?

Tags: Social Media, Social Media Analytics, social media experts, social networks
Posted in Opinion, ProBlogService, Social Media, Social Media Analytics, Social Networks | View Comments

Posts Tagged: social media experts

Ghostwriting = copywriting

Maintaining Ethical Boundaries for Ghost Blogging

Speak to the dog, in the language of the dog, about things that matter to the heart of the dog.

The Tools Don’t Make the Carpenter

Those Who Can’t Do, Coach

Let Me Explain

You Can’t Hire the Real Thought Leaders

Work With a Team Instead of a Talking Head

RSS Feed

Recent Posts

Pro Blog Events

Call Us Now

Email Subscribe

Topics

Sites we love

Recent Blog Posts

Want Pricing or Need a Quote?

Categories