Winona & co. navigating through life after college in 1994′s Reality Bites, just as marketers are facing reality beyond the glamour of social media

I’m a huge fan of leveraging web resources, especially the new ones like social media that have popped up in within the past decade.  But, I’m going to play devil’s advocate.  I don’t think we know enough about social to solely rely on them for lead generation and monetization.  I believe that social media provides a platform to develop conversations that create relationships, which eventually may help generate leads.

The common stigma behind many digital marketing resources is that social media is directly correlated with conversions, and that it will directly generate leads.  It won’t – at least, not on its own.  While we are still discovering the use of all the different mediums that are available, I believe that a huge portion of digital marketing, particularly web 2.0, social media, and user generated content, is not meant to be directly tied to ROI.  It should be used as a complementary marketing tool along with advertising campaigns that are highly measurable such as paid search and online advertising.

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