A roving horde of marketers is looking for you

There's a bit of a scary trend (hence the scary post title) in regard to "tapping into the power of social networking sites" that, I think, has the power to really botch up a good thing.

Articles and seminars abound, advising marketers to harness the power of social networking. The problem is that social networking sites weren't built for marketers. They were built for (gasp) people. The temptation to do said harnessing is understandable. These sites, by gathering groups of people of similar interests in one place, provide those with a related sales opportunity or communication initiative the ability to hit them all at once. The snag is that social networking sites aren't meant to be awesome targeted marketing opportunities, they're spaces for people of like interests and affiliations to form and manage community. That's it.

The more companies and organizations intrude these community spaces, the less people will want to gather there. Think of it as a cocktail party that happens to be attended by people who like luxury cars. How much fun would it be if the guy from the Benz dealership showed up uninvited and started yakking about his new line? Or, not to be too intrusive, he just slipped a bunch of brochures under the door. Not good times.

The increasing openness of networking, thanks to the web, means that we communicators need to exert more self control and plain old good social skills.