Econsultancy posted on Wordpress a set of guidlines: How NOT to be The Social Media Guru" (points included here) and got good response. We produced a "Revisited" follow up that illustrates for arts and profits business: how key words can be used in blogs and what aspects of blogs we feel shopuld be carefully considered by arts people - especially integrity and open-ness about sources.

1. “How Not to be The Social Media Guru” revisited
A blog post from Econsultancy experienced a good first day in the blogosphere.
It was headed: “How Not to be The Social Media Guru” and was posted at 11.24 am
Central European Time (I think). It had 6 comments by 1.50 PM and by 15.45 Central
European Time, five pages A4 listing of Twitter Retweets. (Europeans use the 24 hour
clock convention.) I followed one of those Retweets to get to the post.
The post was born as a reaction to the observation that “there’s a lot of scepticism when it
comes to high-paid constants who claim to have mastered it” (social marketing).” It says:
“that skepticism is reflected in an amusing animation called The Social Media Guru
First, a check of how “ … The Social Media Guru” looks to search engines:
The blog post has these tags: The Social Media Guru, consulting, consultants, snake oil,
clients.
And these words appear in the first paragraph: social media guru, social media, consultants
In the third paragraph are: “The Social Media Guru! “ (2), “100, 000 views on You Tube”
and- social media
“The Social Media Guru” phrase is repeated gain in paragraph 4, social media
And in par. 5: social media consultant, and the ubiquitous again “The Social Media Guru”
Although I felt that search engines might have suffered indigestion by that point, I was
wrong. They loved it. (End of “Blogging 101”, I guess)
What was the fuss about and what is going on here?
Like the lifelong journalist and writer that I am, I looked around for some attribution and a
back-ground on the writer of this highly numerically-successful blog post. In the
Advertising Age’s Adage Power 150 top marketing blogs list, Econsultancy ranks
number 12 (24 November 2009), ahead of Problogger (my favourite blog) by several
places. http://adage.com/power150/
Looking closer
It is ironic that researching the writer, Patricio Robles, a tech specialist with
expertise on social media gurus, has been frustrating:
He does not have a Facebook account - or at least Facebook says under his (?) photo, that he
is “not the one you are looking for …”

2. One picture, recovered by Bing showed a personable, young, lightly-bearded man whose
name could well be Patricio Robles. He has been working in associated fields since about
1993. “About 1994” is more commonly used in e-guru profiles. Seems so long ago, to some
On the Econsultancy website (a kind of co-operative online “club” for ecommerce writers),
Robles is allowed about three lines in his online profile - and no links. (My “deeper” research
found that one Patricio Robles Gil is a respected nature photographer. A passionate singer of
stirring art songs in South America has a similar name.
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Patricio%20Robles%20Gil%20&FORM=BILH#foca
l=dc2e5e0c0b834ec58a80c08389630622&furl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.oceanoasis.org%2Fd
esertandsea%2Fimages%2Fgil150.jpg
On Twitter there can be found, a certain Patricio Robles. But he is aged about 18, poses
with a large dog on his Twitter page and has fewer than 20 followers.
Econsultancy has three accounts on Twitter and this morning the main one was rating 16,361
Followers. Not anywhere near Tour de France cyclists of note, but workable..
All of which is a pity, because the fine mixture of assured-professionalism seemed based on
practical-experience and that rises through the texture of the blog post itself. So, for this
writer, gathering the credentials behind the blog post – forgotten the name? - How Not to be
The Social Media Guru – was fruitless. It is such an interesting, biting, even subversive
affront to all those deserving men and women of internet Gurubia.
The sausage amid the sizzle- 5 tips about keeping out of Internet Gurubia
Turning from the blogging expertise and SEO skills imbedded in it, the substance of the
Econsultancy blog post: “How NOT to be The Social Media Guru” hinges on just 5
points:
Don’t equate prolific use with prolific ability
Bring some experience to the table
Don’t make excuses
Avoid the abstract
Execute, don’t pontificate
Don’t sell fear
Avoid appeal to authority
Your compensation has to be aligned with tasks you pe4rfomr
Don’t call yourself a social media guru
Here is the blog post itself (link)

3. http://www.econsultancy.com/blog/4995/
How arts and non-profits can benefit from this post
You hard-working denizens of arts and non-profits businesses should draw
nourishment from this exercise:
Although most Blogs, Twitters and Facebook Fan Pages pay scant attention to you,
many of their techniques can be stretched with minor distortion, to fit the
communication imperatives of arts and non-profits.
That applies especially to those concerned with content and techniques.
There is enough evidence that - what works for the rough-and-tumble crowd of
entrepreneurs, start-ups along and “creatives” in almost every medium-sized
business on the planet, will help arts and non-profit marketers - by their
example.
What you add to your content is passion, distinction and a unique attention to
craft and art, with a touch-of-class.
However, CAUTION is required!
What you must also add, I think, is a large measure of care to attend to questions of ethics
in communication. Your clients are special: they demand and expect integrity with a fervour
that by far eclipses the demands made upon your general market colleagues.
This is not necessarily the stuff of sacred trust, but your audience, your clients and all those
who contribute to your causes and enthusiasms, do adopt higher standards regarding you.
So the questions of attribution and governance along with the meaning and pitfalls of
social capital bring up questions that you need to consider, especially in hard economic
times. The arts shouldn’t be so vulnerable on such issues, but that is alas, how it is.
I have found several of the sources that raise the questions and some of the answers: The
Saquaro Seminar (Harvard) on Civic Engagement in America, and Ethics World on Non-
Profit Governance.
http://www.ethicsworld.org/corporategovernance/nonprofitgovernance.php
http://www.hks.harvard.edu/saguaro/primer.htm
Opinion:
Even in a fever, most arts marketers wouldn’t repeat a title and “key words” so many
times in five paragraphs. But you (and I) may need to think about how far we can

4. compromise, in order to “succeed” on the internet these days; how much we’ll accept
in terms of the degradation of our language and self-respect - Neil McPherson
Neil McPherson (Lonewordsmith) is director and web master of Professional Word,
an online business dedicated to sharing a well- spring of ideas, resources and
experience to assist hard-pressed and under-resourced arts and non-profit marketers
to produce quality in effective content. He was educated in Australia and now resides
in New Europe.