Reuters just published an article that interviewed "old school" advertising and media big-wigs. They proclaimed that they understood Twitter and Facebook, but didn't have time for it. 

Maurice Levy, chief executive of advertising group Publicis, said, "I hate the idea that I would have to share things which are not for sharing or which are superficial." Evidently, he's never looked at Twitter before.

Levy also said "I understand how to wash dishes. I don't do it regularly." He's right. But housekeeping isn't his job. Selling products is.

Martin Sorrell, of WPP (who owns companies like Ogilvy and JWT), said, "I have enough to do answering your emails...I'm 66 years old. I'm almost in the glue factory."

Saying that you understand Twitter but don't have time for it, is like saying you understand sleeping but you don't have time for it - you will eventually die. Like sleep, to truly appreciate Twitter, you need to experience it.

Do these executives need to be on Twitter 24/7? No, but they at least need to understand that it is more than sharing who you're eating with, as Hearst Magazines president David Carey thinks Twitter was all about. He wouldn't think that way if he spent any time on Twitter.

It's no surprise that old media company's stocks, like Publicis are down about 45% from 10 years ago. It takes mergers and acquisitions for this companies to innovate, not from within.

It's a stark contrast to companies like VaynerMedia, headed by business hustler Gary Vaynerchuck. Gary is actively engaging with his audience on Twitter, take a look at his stream. VaynerMedia has landed client like the New York Jets and Pepsi.

So, do you you really understand social media? Or do you just think you do?

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Several years ago, we all got married to social media. Things were great - we were finding old friends we haven't seen in a while, growing our Facebook fans leaps and bounds and it was all a beautiful thing. There were butterflies and rainbows all around. We were in the honeymoon phase with social media. Back then, it was OK if Social Media didn't really "work."

For most of us, we just were happy to have it around. We got excited about the possibility of posting something on Facebook and jumped for joy whenever someone @ replied us on Twitter.

Awww…those were the good ol' days... How cute.

Like any relationship, it seems like the honeymoon phase is over and it's time to roll up the sleeves and get to work.

It's time to listen
One of the biggest flaws in any relationship is listening. Are you listening to your customers? Be honest with yourself: Are you REALLY listening - or just acting like you are? Only talking (or in some cases, yelling) to your customers is not the way foster any relationship.

Imagine if your significant other texted you, and you didn't respond for days. You'd be in trouble, wouldn't you? Over 70 percent of companies ignore customer complaints on Twitter. Whoa. Can you imagine ignoring what would happen if you didn't reply to 70 percent of the text messages your received?

Here's the good news: 83% of the complainants that received a reply liked or loved the fact that the company responded, regardless of reply.

Lesson: Listen and respond. 

Be a pleasant surprise
Every woman loves flowers. They love them even more when they are a pleasant surprise. Everyone likes a great surprise. In fact, some researchers even place creativity as the top reason relationships stay together.

Be creative. Offer your fans a special discount code. Be like WineLibrary.com and simply call to thank your customers. Don't try to sell them something. Just say thanks.

If you're feeling really adventurous, see what they are passionate about (since you follow each other on Twitter) and blow them out of the water. Do they like the Rangers? Then buy them tickets to the World Series. You'll have a customer to life.

Lesson: Get creative to show the love.

Is it time to get a counselor?
A good counselor can solve a lot of problems. Social media is no different. Maybe it's time to bring an objective third-party in to discuss the details of your relationship. They'll be able to see pain-points that you can't. They'll have the experience of working with other companies and know what works.

And yes, this means paying someone money to do so.

Lesson: Hire someone to get your through the funk.

For those without the fortunate blessing of having nerds in your life, yesterday Facebook reinvented itself - again. It's no doubt that Facebook feels pressure to keep innovating on their already life-changing product (trying going a week without checking Facebook and tell me it's not life-changing). TechCrunch has a great rundown of the actual new features, but I thought it would be helpful to talk less about the features and more about what this means for you and I going forward.

1. Facebook wants to be the online version of your life. Take a look at Timelines (the new profile, mine is show above). This is a scrapbook for your life. As you scroll, you can see what happened in 1989, for example: My little brother was born and Facebook shows a picture, automatically, of both of us together. Facebook wants to be involved in the major moments of you life. My co-worker even put an injury in her Timleline, and associated a picture with it. This will forever be in her Timeline. Looking back at this month, it showcased my recent vacation, which is much more important to remember than some random posts.
2. Facebook wants sharing to be automatic. Facebook is no longer about sharing, it's about what you're doing. Their music launch has been incredible. I listen to Spotify at work all day and the tracks I'm listening to are automatically shared on my Facebook profile. I've gotten tons of comments about songs I'm listening to, and even had a friend join in on the music I was listening to. Facebook is expanding this to reading, watching, cooking, eating - you get the idea. Once you connect an application, like Spotify, it automatically shares everything you listen to. There is now no more barrier to sharing.
3. Facebook wants more of your time. I've had the chance to play with the new features today and yesterday (they'll be rolled out to everyone soon) and I have to admit, it's addicting. I've probably spent more time on Facebook in the past 24 hours than I have in total over the past 2 weeks. By sharing more, the internet is about to get a whole lot interesting and powerful.
4. Facebook is the glue that holds the internet together. If you had any doubt that Facebook had staying power, those were erased yesterday. Every new app you download on your iPhone, every website will be integrated (even deeper, if they aren't already) with Facebook. 
5. Facebook is getting smart. Very smart. Facebook is even stepping into the recommendation game (and, I'd argue, search game) with their new product called Graph Rank. Are you sick of Farmville invites? Graph Rank will recognize that and not show you any other similar games. Do you like to read news in the morning and listen to music during the day? Graph Rank will recognize that and show you news stories (and stories you are interested in) and show you what your friends are listening to during the day. Pretty amazing.

Will this frustrate people that hate change? Absolutely. Will this ultimately make Facebook a larger part of our life? Yes. Will people have to be more careful about what they share online? You better believe it. 

We forget that the internet is all about change. We wouldn't be where we are without innovation and we'll eventually be better for all of these changes. There's no doubt that the next generation of the internet will be built using these amazing tools.

It's true, I have a man crush on Gary Vaynerchuk. Just so we're clear, here's how Urban Dictionary (the only dictionary in my world) defines a man crush: "When a straight man has a 'crush' on another man, not sexual but kind of idolizing him." Here's why I have a man crush:

1. Gary practices what he preaches. For those of you that don't know Gary, he's a well-known expert in Social Media and wine. Unlike most "experts" in social media, he is extremely engaged with his fans. I've tweeted several of the other "experts" and I get no reply. It's ridiculous that you preach engagement to companies, but don't even reply to your own fans. 

2. Gary is a hustler. Like him, at a young age I started hustling. I once got busted in middle school because I was selling bubblegum. I would go to Costco, buy the gum in bulk and sell the gum for less than the Spirit Store (the store inside the school). The principal got mad that I was undermining the profits of the store. Gary has a very similar story about selling people flowers he just picked from their own lawn.

3. Gary is real. When I've tweeted him before, his tweets aren't perfectly crafted (most don't even have proper capitalization). But that's ok. That's Gary. If you ever see him give a talk, he's exactly the same as if he were in a huge corporation's board room. I once heard a story of him being hounded on the ROI of social media. He replied, after having enough, "What's the ROI of your mother?!" That's being real.

4. Gary can win over any audience. I had a friend who didn't really care for Gary after reading some of his work. I finally convinced him to come to a Gary talk and he was instantly won over. My friend even tweeted him yesterday (and, of course, Gary replied).

5. Gary has big goals. Gary wants to own the Jets. Almost anyone that knows something about Gary, knows his lofty goal. Having big goals and making them public pushes you harder to meet those goals.

6. Gary has passion. Passion trumps experience or knowledge. End of story.

Google+

Google plus has been the most overhyped product since the Segway. Google+ fails to do several things:

• It fails to solve any problems. I don't care if you are in a circle. Seriously.
• It gives me no reason or incentive to check Google+ over Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. The only time I check it is if I see a notification in Gmail.
• It is, if we are all honest, nothing new. You could slap a Twitter or Facebook logo over the Google+ logo and I wouldn't be surprised.

I do think that Google+ will be more important for Google search, but right now, the most over-hyped website of the century award goes to Google+.

Spotify
You may have heard about Spotify, but you can't understand it until you start to use it. Spotify has almost every song ever produced, for free.

Unlike Google+, Spotify wins in many different areas:

• It solves a problem. We pay too much for music (whether is be through iTunes, Amazon or CDs). Spotify has a free version. Last time I checked, free is better than the over $1,000 I've spent on iTunes over the past couple years.
• It's something different. It's a completely new way of playing music. Imagine having an unlimited iTunes credit - that's what you have with Spotify.
• Today, I couldn't wait to get back from a meeting, turn on Spotify and listen to some new tunes.
• It's social, without reinventing the wheel. It's integrated with Facebook, all of your friends show up in a sidebar. You can click on their name, see their playlists and send them songs. Easy peasy and beautiful.
• It's also super fast. iTunes = slow monster. Spotify = superhero fast.
• Spotify makes me feel stupid for ever spending so much on iTunes. I upgraded to the Premium version after a couple of days, simply because I hated the ads and I wanted to use the mobile app. It was well worth it.

If I were you, I'd stop making stupid circles in Google+ and start making some playlists and share them with me.

Social media can be a powerful tool for business. With a solid plan, concrete goals, a pipeline full of great content and the right people to pull it off, organizations can get everything from deeper relationships with consumers to more website or store traffic.

But the hidden benefits of social media can be valuable, too. Here are a few of my favorites:

Employee Insights
The first step in any good social media plan is to listen, and listening to your employees who are active on social media can be very revealing. In many ways social media works like a litmus test for people’s professionalism, loyalty and integrity. Best of all, it also highlights your strongest brand advocates – the people who get a kick out of their work and love telling the world about it.

Research
Thanks to social media, consumer insights are only a post or tweet away. By simply asking questions, businesses can get quick, low-cost feedback from their social communities. Of course, every day is like a flash focus group on an active social media site. Comments, Likes and re-tweets can be a gold mine of information for sales, customer service and marketing.

Recruiting
It goes without saying that most hiring managers will review an applicant’s social media activity. The same is true today for job seekers who are researching businesses. A strong social media presence can raise an organization’s profile among top talent and can also help fill open positions more quickly.

These hidden benefits reinforce the fact that social media is all about people, and you can never go wrong by listening and learning from your employees and customers. 

In November of 2010, LinkedIn introduced a series of new features for company pages. In the past few months, Balcom Agency has studied and maximized these features on its own company page to better understand them and to ensure our page is engaging and useful for viewers. 

Now that we've spiffed up our presence, we want to help you do the same. 

Here are a few ways you can optimize LinkedIn for your business: 

Boost the Basics

All company pages include an "Overview" tab with basic information on a company, including company size, industry, website and physical address. In addition to the basics, LinkedIn offers the opportunity for businesses to include a description of services and specialties. To help people find you, ensure your company description is search-engine optimized by including words your customers might use in their search. For instance, if you work in advertising, be sure to include 'advertising' in your description, but also use similar terms like 'marketing,' 'branding' and 'public relations.' Be sure to also reference the geographical areas you serve, so people can find you if they search by region. Finally, take advantage of LinkedIn's integration with Twitter and blogs. Pull through your tweets and blog posts to extend your presence beyond your page and encourage continued engagement with prospects and customers.

Soup Up Your Services

Since November, LinkedIn has added a "Products & Services" tab to company pages. Here, you can add modules for each of your products and services with search-engine-optimized descriptions and bulleted lists of key attributes or features. You can also include a rich graphic to represent each product or service, a specific URL where users can go for more information, and links to profiles of employees who can be contacted with questions or leads. 

LinkedIn also enables companies to include up to three of their own rotating banner ads linking to specific landing pages. To engage and educate clients and prospects, Balcom has included ads directing people to opt-in to our e-newsletter or learn more about client success stories. Users can also pull in YouTube videos for both the "Products & Services" tab and each individual product or service. We've included our showreel, showcasing some of our best work.

Finally, companies can request and then display positive endorsements of their products from colleagues or clients on LinkedIn. The more of these features a company can leverage, the higher engagement will be and the more likely a page will generate new business.

Customize for Each Customer

LinkedIn designers are savvy enough to know that companies have different clients - with different needs. Hence, new company pages enable companies to tailor their message to a specific audience. Include a different description, graphic, landing page, banner ad and video depending on the viewer. All you have to do is define your demographic. 

Follow the Finest

One of the fastest ways to learn how to be great is to observe the best. Follow other companies on LinkedIn to learn best practices. An obvious leader, LinkedIn maximizes the features of its own company page. Other role models include Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and, of course, Balcom Agency. Surprisingly, not many companies are yet leveraging the new features on LinkedIn. For instance, neither Facebook nor Google have updated their company pages. Updating your company page will not only make you an early adopter, showcasing your eagerness to stay abreast of new technologies, but it can help drive web traffic, generate leads and attract the best talent.

We encourage you to experiment with the latest features of LinkedIn. We have, and already we are seeing results.

A young single woman, I often ask my married friends and family, “How do you know when you’ve found The One?” Invariably, despite geographic, ethnic, age and gender differences, they reply confidently, “You just know.”

This seemingly smug response always irked me, until I felt it. 

Call me a workaholic. Call me a geek. Call me pathetic. But I felt it at work. I love my job. No, really… I do.

Let me count the reasons why:

1. Variety Is the Spice of Life.

As social media manager at Balcom, I’m responsible for managing a wide variety of online communities for a wide variety of clients. On a daily basis, I chat with customers about fajitas, cowboy boots, diamond rings, country music, margaritas, payday loans, puppies and even social media marketing.

I toggle between Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, Foursquare, Gowalla and MySpace. I learn how to write great status updates, squeeze messages into 140 characters, respond gracefully to customer complaints, optimize web copy and create compelling online offers. Most importantly, I learn how to engage consumers, which brings me to my next point.

2. Social Media Sells.

But not because of slippery, slimy sales offers. Social media sells because it engages consumers in a way that they want to be engaged.

On the Justin Boots Facebook Page, for instance, I collaborate with my clients to share meaningful and valuable information with fans. This means that for every post reading “Boots are half off today!" we post a fan photo, an update on local rodeo standings, a list of country music tour dates, a question to fans about their weekend plans or a simple thank you. We even ask our fans, "What do you want to hear from us?" and deliver. 

Interacting with consumers each day in an authentic way fulfills me, all while driving revenues.  

3. We Learn – And Then We Learn From Our Mistakes.

Balcom Agency and good social media marketers embrace continual learning. We also believe in taking risks and learning from our mistakes. In my role as social media manager, I soak up breaking news on the latest technologies, trends and techniques in marketing. Much akin to my eating habits, I consume this information voraciously.

At Balcom Agency and in the world of social media, mistakes are accepted. And transformed into opportunities to learn and improve. When I err, I’m not harshly punished but encouraged to seek the lesson in the error.  Inevitably, these faux pas lead to even better performance and client service.

4. We Are Family.

At Balcom, we truly love each other.

Did you just roll your eyes? I understand. Perhaps my enthusiasm for my colleagues is akin to those nagging Facebook status updates: “I have the best life ever!" or "My boyfriend spoils me!" But really, we get along like peas and carrots. We joke. We laugh. We brainstorm. We challenge. We achieve. And sometimes we even have a beer together. I never thought I could love my coworkers like I do. It makes a big difference.

In closing, thank you for the opportunity to gush about my beloved job.  Beyond an awareness of my tendency toward self-indulgence, I hope you’ll take just a few things away from this post. Social media works. Mistakes are opportunities. And kindness, humor and honesty in the workplace pay off, not just in the form of happy employees, but also in happy clients. 

There has been a lot of talk about the Jay Leno/Conan O'Brien battle, so I thought I'd throw my digital marketing gloves into the ring. For the record, I'm Team Conan.

Conan's target is younger males (probably around 18 - 35). Most young males don't watch NBC or care about Jay Leno. I'd jump ship to a network willing to take a chance. The FOX crowd (with the likes of The Simpsons, Family Guy) would be a perfect fit. FOX would be happy to give him the 10:35 spot. However, I wouldn't depend on TV to build his personal brand. Instead, I'd recommend Conan investigate these opportunities:

• Offer his show on iTunes - both as a full show and bite-size pieces. Do it for free. Get some big-name sponsors to do funny product placement bits (à la Stephen Colbert).
• Conan has always been more interactive with his fans. Imagine the best-executed Facebook page, where fans could submit jokes, videos, comments and ideas. 
• Conan is great off-the-cuff. He would be great personality for live Q&As with his fans.
• Jimmy Fallon has 2.4 million followers on Twitter. Imagine insight into Conan's life on Twitter. It could be incredibly funny.
• Equip him with a phone to broadcast live video. Similar what we did to Justin Bent Rail, his never-before-seen moments could be more popular than the (sometimes) well-rehearsed show.
• Give each of his popular characters a chance to have their own presence. Fake twitter accounts have attracted millions of followers, I'm sure some of his characters could do the same.
• If Apple's much-rumored tablet comes out to fruition, knock down Apple's door to be one of the founding content providers.
• Create a robust, mobile-friendly site with video formatted to work on many devices (Blackberry, Windows, Android, etc.). Encourage visitors to get text-message updates when new videos are posted.
• Offer free stand-up shows to those following Conan on social media or text-message.

After a few years holding down a Blogger account, I registered my first domain in 2003. Over the next six years, I changed it three times. (What can I say - I was indecisive.) I played with WordPress and Type Pad, but still, despite the fact that it can be a pain in the rear, my favorite blogging platform remained MovableType.

Eventually, I threw in the towel. I felt like I had said all that I had to say. I was tired of sharing, so when my last domain expired in 2009, so did my blog. I said goodbye to lots of blogging buddies. I've made some great friends, and I've had the pleasure of meeting some wonderful people "in real life" thanks go blogging.

When we tackled the redesign of BalcomAgency.com, we wanted to have a voice, a way to reach out and interact with you: our clients, our vendors and our friends. Blogging became the doorway between our lives and our workplace and yours. We give you some industry insight. We tell you funny stories. We make you read about quilts. (Okay, that's just me...)

Here at the B, I am the most frequent blogger so much so that we all poke fun at and joke about my (excessive) posting. Of our collective 130ish blog posts, 55 are mine. As it turns out, I wasn't out of things to say after all!

With all of this nerdery under my belt, it's with great excitement that today, I bring Delurker Day to the B.

Delurker Day is loads of fun for bloggers. We know that we're posting things, that somehow you're finding your way to us, and that you're reading (after all – we are in love with our analytics!). We appreciate every comment we get and love interacting with you. But we also know that some of you are the quiet type – that you take in the things we say without ever replying because, let's face it, sometimes, "Neat!" just doesn't feel comment-worthy.

Today is the one day we're asking you to say hello. We want to know who you are. Do you feel like you always comment and that, "Nah – they already know me!" Go ahead – say hi anyway! Maybe you've never commented before? Give it a shot. You'll love it.

Be sure to visit the blogs of all of your favorite B's today and say hello! We'll B Excited to hear from you.