Snap out of it

To try and avoid projecting the image of ranting helplessly in the face of ignorance, I'll attempt to navigate my way around certain clouds in my head toward understanding how and why Online Reputation Management (ORM) may or may not be the elusive grand solution to any digital/social media/webpr/online guy's major problem; that is, finding and maintaining focus long enough to crack the vague level he's currently on and proceed to the next non-level.

I think I've reached the point where I see ORM, or at least one of its many magical powers, the same way I'd imagine a roving reporter at a stadium rock concert tasked with getting a vox pop from every person who attended: 'Good evening, sir. Can you briefly tell me about your experience here this evening?'... thousands of times.

What makes this kind of reporting slightly different to that done on crime, sports, politics, entertainment, etc is the process of data analysis, and therein lies the problem. This expansive data has to be processed, analysed and interpreted while it's being generated, and only once this uber exercise in multi-tasking is complete can one shift from hyper- to mild-anxiety and compile a report detailing the successes and failures of the campaign. Seems like voodoo, alright. Didn't we integrate computers into our lives to avoid the burden of multi-tasking in the first place?

From this sprouts a paradox. Using of the word 'campaign', as we often do in our business, implies there is a beginning, a middle bit and a climax. How should a person working on a medium that was developed and is continuously developing entirely organically approach reputation reporting and management when what he/she is working on is conceived and subsequently planned in strict adherence to a timeframe? I think now's the time to kill all that buzz around the advantages of the Internet's immediacy.

Experience in research has taught me that the only good report is a done report (thanks, Prof Kariithi) and the only good way to get a report done is to take time and think about it as deeply as you think you possibly can, note those thoughts, find relevant things to read, review your notes with the reading in mind, conjure up an hypothesis and test it with your data in order to justify, in conclusion, the inherent thread of partiality throughout the process.

This tried and tested research process would work well for a postgraduate producing a paper on the ephemeral and simultaneously self-rejuvenating nature of the Internet and social media, but not for a digital strategist eyeing a non-level from the precarious vantage point of a vague one.

Isn't it time to develop a simple methodology for qualifying the vast quantity in a manner that bypasses the 'rating system' and its obfuscating implications? Should reputation management tools out there offer methodological solutions rather than final reporting solutions, or do they already? But most importantly, isn't the creation of a custom methodology part of keeping up with the Internet's dynamism?

Maybe viewing something in awe is the first step toward learning about it.

Yours sincerely,
Ahmed Patel